Presgrub: and average alternian
by volpes-somnium
Summary: Ever wonder what daily life on Alternia was like before the troll's session of sgrub? Follow the story of one very out of place sburb player and her adventures with the trolls of homestuck to find out. any comments or complaints will be read with much amusement! rated T for teen angst, awkward moments, and hints of sadstuck occasionally.
1. An average alternian

_Alright, my first chapter to my debute story on here. A lot of this is going to be written from the OC's point of view, because it seemed interesting to write it that way. My apologies any for atrocious grammatical errors you happen to find while reading. I once heard it said that you shouldn't judge a story until you've read the first three chapters, and I love that advice. Hopefully, you will too?_

_Blargh! Enough of my musing! Enjoy the story~_

* * *

_OH GOG. So Looking back on this, I realized the opening was kind of awful. So I altered it a bit to a slightly better explaination of the story's prelude. So yeah. Also, I was surprised today to find I'd been sharing my chumhandle with someone else for the past several months and never even noticed. they were awesome, and we got it all sorted out.  
_

_Anways, you can thank them and their epicness for me getting around to writing again, so yeah. if you enjoy this madness, I'm honored that you enjoy my writing, and you can thank them for more of it.~  
_

* * *

It had never been my intention to become friends with the nubby horned troll. Then again, a lot of things had not gone the way I intended for them. It just sort of. . .happened.

It was now my second month as a troll. I didn't truly belong on Alternia at all, if I was being honest. But a curiosity had lead to a fascination, which had lead to something bordering on an obsession, which had lead me to do something stupid with my powers that I'm still not entirely sure of.

My name is Volpes Natore, and I am a player of sburb. A human player. At least, I used to be. As a seer of life, I was one of four players who managed to beat the game. But then things had gone wrong. Very,very. . .But we're not going to get into that right now. We'll get into that later. maybe. Probably in a flashback that may or may not involve a lot of shooshes and paps.

The short story is I doomed my co-players to a horrible fate, and they'll never forgive me.

Being the seer of life led me to many strange places while I slept, including other sessions of sburb, or the memories of them. There was always one group in particular I was always being drawn to though, an alien race, from an ancient planet, called Alternia. I dreamed of them, and watched them from bubbles of memories as they tried their best to win at their own session. The last bubble I was able to view was of a Demon clad in black, destroying the door to their prize.

I worried about them. I'd come to view many of them as allies in this insane game, even if they had never known I'd existed. I'd spent days thinking of what I might look like, what I might have been, had I been from their world. You might have been able to call me a fan girl of sorts. But what else was there to do, really? I was alone in my own session, with nothing to do. The last thing I can make sense of was falling asleep in the ruins of Prospit, hoping to find another one of their memories in a dream bubble.

And then I awoke in a familiar place, but one that certainly shouldn't have existed. I awoke in the hive I had imagined living in, had I been a troll. bringing my hands to my line of sight revealed gray skin. I had, in fact, become a troll, complete with two lussii I'd thought of before.

Naturally, I did what any sane person would do after waking up in the body of a fan-troll version of themselves. I slammed my head into a wall to be sure I was awake. and then I dumped a bucket of water on my head. and maybe a couple of other silly things. There's a good chance I would have jumped off of the roof of my hive if one of my Lussi hadn't dragged me inside and made me sit on the couch until I was thinking rationally again.

The first thing I did after freaking out was figure out at what point in the time line I was. seemed to have been dropped into Alternia about six months before the troll's session of sburb, they called it sgrub, began. I'd been given a blood color similar to Feferi's, whom I'd deemed my 'patron troll', being a picses myself. mine was mixed with a little more purple than the fuschia color of hers, but the fins protruding from either side of my head were a little hard to miss.

There was also another problem. My eyes were glowing. they changed from the purple of Derse to the golden shine of Prospit, one fading into the other repetitively. This had been something that had started not long after I'd achieved god-tier, but since I didn't seem to be able to use any of my other powers, I was surprised by this turn of events. It seemed I would have to find a way to hide both my eyes and my fins if I didn't want to draw attention to myself.

* * *

It had been hard, choosing who to try talking to first. Trollian was running by the time I had arrived, and I already knew the twelve troll's handles by heart. My first impulse had been to pester Eridan or Equius, the two trolls I had been looking forward to talking to since the first or second time I'd seen them. But then again, I was aiming _not_ to fuck up horribly and make myself sound like more of an oddity then I already was. So Instead, I ended up taking a walk like I usually did when I couldn't think of what to do.

Let me explain what I now look like as well here.

I used to wear a lot of brown, but to fit into troll fashion, I wear a black, really soft and fuzzy jacket, gray jeans, a black T-shirt shirt with my symbol on it, drawn in silver, and a black knit hat, which has my charm attached to the side, as well as fox ears knitted onto it, which are white on their insides. My charm is a lotus, carved from silver, and my symbol resembles a music note, with a spiral as the base and the tip being a wavy arrow. the whole thing can be drawn in one line.

my hair is usually in a pony tail, aside from my weird bangs, which are spirally ringlets that I usually have hanging right along the sides of my eyes. my newly aquired horns poke through holes in my knitted hat, and they curve upward, like those classic little devil horns, but maybe a little less evil and little more playful. they jut out on either side of my head, just above and my bangs, but back towards my ears a little more. Er, fins I suppose. I like to keep my eyes hidden under my hat, but I'm still able to see through gaps in the knitting. my jacket has headphones built in to the strings, which are silver, and I usually listen to some kind of trance music while walking, because if I let my mind just wander these days, it usually settles on bad memories.

And trust me, I've got a lot of those.

* * *

I ended up walking into a nearby neighborhood, with a bunch of look alike hives lined up together. shaking my head, I smile a bit to myself, happy that I lived more towards the edge of town and close to the lake. I was still smiling to myself When someone slammed into me.

"FUCK!" Somebody shouted as the two of us went sprawling onto the side walk. I rolled sideways as I fell, coming up on my knees. months of combat mode had yet to wear off it seemed. The Ironic thing was, I recognized the troll I had crashed into. his name was Karkat, and he was one of the twelve people on the planet who I happened to know. Of course, that did nothing, since he had no fucking clue who the hell I was.

"FUCK. WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU?" Karkat was shouting, starting to pick himself up. I was already on my feet, and I crouched to offer him my hand, and a small grin.

"Sorry about that. I didn't have time to get out of the way when you turned the corner." I apologized, watching him ignore my hand and pick himself up, still glaring.

"I didn't ask you for some fucking shitty excuse for why you knocked me over, I asked you for your fucking name." He growled. He seemed to be actually looking at me now, noticing that my eyes were covered by my hat, so he couldn't glare at me directly."And how in the fuck you think you can walk around blind, with that stupid shitty hat covering your fucking eyes." And my new found fins of course, not that he'd notice those under the knitting.

"Actually, I see pretty well this way. I told you, I just didn't dodge in time." I repeated, grinning at Karkat's mounting frustration now. " And, my name's Volpes. Can I ask yours?"Karkat sighed, clearly trying to keep his temper in check now.

"No. you can not ask me for my god damn name. Is this how you make friends or something? you just go around knocking people over, arguing with them that's it's their fault you shoved them, and then asking for their name and assuming everything is fucking magical again?" he ranted, clearly on a roll now. I simply shrugged, surprisingly relaxed.

"I guess so, if you want to call us friends now. I just wanted to know your name." I answered, my grin widening as Karkat finally lost it. He lunged at me, probably hoping to punch my face in and knock me over, but I was prepared. I sidestepped him and grabbed his swinging fist, tripping him, knocking him to the ground and pinning his arm behind his back, then sitting on him, now trying not to laugh a bit.

"GET. . .THE FUCK. . OFF ME. . YOU SHIT EATING WRIGGLER BRAINED PIECE OF. . .ARRGH!" Karkat snarled, thrashing and wriggling in pure rage. I sighed, shaking my head, but I stood, releasing my grip, and then offering my hand again to help him up.

"Jeez. . . ." I sighed, still grinning as this time, Karkat took my hand up. "Look, all I wanted to know was the name of the guy I ran into. Would it be such a pain in the ass to tell me your name?" I asked, helping him up. Even if I actually already knew his name.

"Karkat. . . Karkat Vantas." Karkat finally relented after a while, eyeing me suspiciously.

"How in the fuck did you pin me anyway?" he asked after his rage had begun to subside. I shrugged, looking up at the setting sun. "I'm just good at fighting I guess." I answered simply, still smiling.

"Hey, do you have a trollian account?" I asked, my heart now beating a little faster. This was the important step, getting a chance to keep talking to one of them. Karkat glared at me, but nodded.

"Yeah. My handle is CarnicoGenesist. What about you?" He answered finally.

"dazedDreamer." I replied simply. I looked down the street and back to where Karkat was standing. "You live around here right? which hive is yours?"

Karkat shook his head, muttering something, but pointed to a hive three doors down. "that one. what about you? don't you live here, or do you just enjoy wandering the fuck around other troll's houses like a fucking creep?"

I grinned, shrugging. "I just like taking walks. I live over a couple blocks, by the lake." Karkat nodded, rubbing his forehead.

"I should probably be getting back now. my lususes are going to be waking up soon. . ." I muttered, watching the sun set. Karkat eyed me suspiciously.

"Lusus. . es? as in more than one?" He asked. I grinned, nodding.

"Yeah, as in two. Maybe I'll explain later. see you around karkat!" I said, turning back around and striding down the street towards my hive. I could feel an annoyed glare burning into the back of my skull, but I shrugged it off. I now had a friend. kind of. Maybe more of an enemy. But since trolls shared the same word for both friend and enemy, it could easilly have been both.


	2. Clowns, secrets, and teen angst

_~I'm rapidly getting the hang of uploading and editing these as best I can. I'm used to working on Quizilla, so writing on here is a little odd to me. To those of you who are still reading after the first chapter, I promise it will (Probably) only get better from there. Pretty sure I set a low bar to go from, but hey. Everything will be fixed eventually.~_

* * *

I awoke the next morning certain of three things. One, that these slime casket things trolls slept in were pretty comfortable, two, I still found it awkward that you had to sleep in your birthday suit if you wanted to avoid ruining good clothes, and three, that my huskbook had just pinged to tell me someone was pestering me.

Yawning, I emerged from my slime cocoon, stretching one arm out and then the other. I groped around and soon found the towel I always left by the edge of the pod, wrapping that around me as I slipped into the bathroom. I washed the slime off in a quick shower, not even really bothering to turn the heated water on. I stepped out to find a set of clothes identical to the ones I had been wearing yesterday sitting on the bathroom countertop. No, wait. those were gray jean shorts, not pants. meh, whatever. Nez must have chosen today.

Zen and Nez were my two Lususes. they were two identical foxes, but about the size of horses. the only difference was that Nez's left eye glowed black, and Zen's right eye glowed a silvery white. they would usually set out my clothes and other stuff when I wasn't looking, or at least Zen would. Nez kind of preffered to show up when I was goofing off instead.

I changed into the clean clothes, picking up my trusted black hat and pulling it over my eyes and effectively hiding my fins. It had been redish brown when I started this game, but I had changed the yarn's color on my way to this session. god I loved this hat.

even if it did bring back some particularly bad memories.

I wandered back into my room, my damp hair tucked within a ponytail as usual, aside from my bangs, which I twirled around my fingers absentmindedly, forming them into perfectly identical twin spirals. I picked up my huskbook and sat down, leaning against a wall as I brought up pesterchum to see who had been pestering me earlier.

* * *

falloutPrincess began pestering dazedDreamer at ?:?

FP: I know your there.

FP: Quit avoiding me.

* * *

Oh great. she'd managed to un-block herself again.

* * *

falloutPrincess began pestering dazedDreamer at ?:?

FP: I know your there.

FP: Quit avoiding me.

DD: ~I can only take a shower so fast.~

FP: Fucking exscuses, as UsUaL.

DD:~ You're not exactly someone I want to talk to you know. there's a reason I've banned you seven times~

FP: and there's a reason I keep coming back, you manipulative backstabbing bItCh.

DD: ~We've been over this. you tried to kill me. you talked the others into _helping _you in trying to kill me. How am I the manipulative one after everything that happened? ~

FP: We only did it to protect ourselves from your LiEs.

DD: ~ No. THEY did it to follow YOU. YOU did it because you thought I was doing something I wasn't, and never intended to do. It was your own paranoia that led you and them to your fate. Quit blaming everything on me and face up to your faults for once.~

FP: I never HaD any faults VoLpEs! yOu LiEd To Me, YoU bEtRaYeD uS, aNd So HeLp Me, I wIlL mOtHeRfUcKiNg MaKe YoU pAy.

DD:~ . . .Look. I'm done with this. Talk to me when you're ready to look at reason. In the mean time, just. . .leave me alone to my own life.~

DazedDreamer ceased pestering falloutPrincess at ?:?

dazedDreamer blocked falloutPrincess at ?:?

* * *

I sighed, rubbing my forehead. I was so tired of that. so many bad memories I wished would just. . .learn to leave me alone. For a while before, I actually began to wonder if she was right. Things like that could drive a person mad you know. but after a long time of self reflection, I knew who I was, and I knew what had happened to my three co-players wasn't my fault. they had chosen their own path. I had chosen mine.

I yawned, tilting my head up towards the black cieling of the room. white flecks that were meant to be stars peppered the midnight sky atmosphere. Closing the huskbook, I stood, captchalogging it in my Zodiac Modus, filing it under the 'rat'. The modus was pretty simple, yet fun. to pull things out of the chinese Zodiac section, I listed a year, got whatever was stored in the corresponding animal's log. Like, to get my huskbook, I would say '1996', a year of the rat. This gave me twelve spaces, but I had another twelve sections for western astrology, which got more complicated. I could store things under an exact date in there, and saying something like 'march 11' would release anything stored under the march 11th file. Okay, so it was actually pretty confusing. But I liked it.

I found a plate of toasted bagels, sasuage, and sliced fruits I didn't recognize sitting out for me on the kitchen counter. Glancing around, I saw no sight of my supposed Lususes though. shrugging, I picked up the plate of food and walked out to the back deck of my hive, looking out over the large, dark lake that opened up outside my hive. It would have been pretty if I wasn't pretty sure there was a giant, troll eating creature living in it.

I was about half way through the bagel when I heard shouting. . . and a lot of swear words.

"GOD FUCKING DAMN IT GAMZEE! NO, I DO NOT WANT TO GO FIND HER! I WANT YOU TO FUCKING TURN YOUR SHIT HIVE FAYGO DRINKING ASS AROUND AND I WANT TO FUCKING GO HOME!" A familiar snarling broke the silence. My ears pricked from under my hat. It was definetely Karkat, but did he say. . . Gamzee?

Grinning, I walked around the wrap around deck to the front , observing discreetly as two trolls walked towards my hive. Yes, that was in fact, and undenyiably Gamzee Makara, dragging Karkat along behind him as he grinned in his stoner-esk way, holding a plastic bag in his other hand.

"CoMe On MoThErFuCkEr, YoU kNoCkEd HeR oVeR yEsTeRdAy. BeSiDeS, ShE sOuNdS lIkE a CoOl SiS." Gamzee answered, trying to calm Karkat's obvious and violent rage in his own, odd and amusing way. My grin widened as I watched the two of them make their way towards my door. I perched on the railing of my second-level deck, waving down at them as they came into my yard. Karkat's rage turned to obvious horror as he realized I had probably been watching them the whole time.

"DAMN IT GAMZEE, LET ME GO!" he screamed, Finally thrashing free of the taller troll's grip. Gamzee looked up and grinned, waving at me in return.

"HeY tHeRe SiS! I'm GaMzEe! We WeRe WonDeRin' If YoU wAnTeD tO cOmE sLaM a CoUpLe Of FaYgOs WiTh Us!" He shouted up, lifting up the plastic bag in his other hand, which I realized was full of a bunch of different flavors of Faygo.

"uh. . .yeah, alright!" I called back, and then, for show, I leapt off of the balcony, landing with cat like grace a few yards in front of them. Gamzee's grin grew wider, if that was possible, and he muttered something about 'Motherfuckin' magic' as I walked over to them.

"so, Gamzee, right? Nice to meet you then. you must be Karkat's friend if you're with him." I said, nodding over to Karkat, who had fallen backwards when he escaped Gamzee's hold, and was still sitting on the ground, maybe a little shocked by my leap. He quickly recovered though, fixing me with another 'I hate you for no reason' glare. I grinned in return, offering a hand up, which he ignored again.

"The only fucking reason we're here is because Gamzee wanted to see your god damn hat after I had to explain how you fucking _knocked me over_ yesterday." Growled Karkat angrily, glaring at me as if it was my fault he was an angsty, pissed off teenager.

Gamzee looked from Karkat to me and back again with a slightly confused look, but shrugged and grinned. I had a feeling there was a longer story involved, but I was too lazy to really persist. Instead, I reached over into the bag of Faygos and pulled out what i was guessing was an 'original' flavor, since it had no special title. I cracked open the cap and, sniffing it a bit first, downed a couple of gulps. It tasted like strawberry fanta, but with some other flavor in it too. Gamzee grinned as I nodded in approval, while Karkat shook his head, clearly wanting to be anywhere else at the moment.

I glanced back at my house, then shrugged to myself. "Hey, since you both came out here, do you want to come in? it's not like I get many guests out here." I offered. Karkat opened his mouth to shout what probably would have been a withering protest, if Gamzee hadn't cut in with "Sounds great motherfucker!" and begun walking inside. Karkat slowly closed his mouth, facepalming and stomping after him and into my house. I sighed, shaking my head at the pair's bi-polar antics as I followed after them.

It hadn't taken long to passify Karkat as it turned out. I had rented a bunch of troll movies to watch last week, and half of them were romcoms. as soon as Karkat saw those he at least slowed the cussing streak, he almost seemed to be content when I told him we could have a marathon of romcoms, and he could choose the line up. Gamzee didn't care, as long as he had his faygo and I let him explore my house. It was only about halfway through our marathon that Gamzee started to notice a few things.

"Hey Sis, I was wondering. . . where are you from? I mean, I don't see anything with your motherfuckin' blood color on it, and no one was livin' anywhere motherfuckin' near here last sweep. Your hive just kind of. . . showed up." He asked between gulps of his fourth bottle of faygo. I figured it was going to be Karkat asking this shit, not Gamzee, but I had answers anyway. Karkat had definetely been interested though. I noticed him glancing over, looking for any sign of color and realizing Gamzee was right.

"Well, I moved here from another city a couple of months ago. My last hive. . .got destroyed in a funny way. a meteor hit it and pretty much destroyed it while I was gone with my lususes." I lied, but as usual Karkat cut in.

"A fucking Meteor blew up your hive? what the hell kind of bullshit is that? do we look like wrigglers to you? and what the fuck do you mean Lususes? you were supposed to fucking explain that." He shouted, pausing the movie that had been playing. I shrugged while grinning a bit.

"oh yeah motherfucker. . . how can you see under that hat?"Gamzee threw in, causing Karkat to perform another face palm. My grin widened.

"Well, in order. . . You can look it up yourself, it was in some papers that my hive got destroyed. Yes, I have more than one Lusus, I've got two foxes, and they're brothers. and, as for seeing, I look through gaps in the knitting of the hat, it's actually not too hard." I explained (and or lied) calmly, stretching a little. this seemed to annoy Karkat even more, so he threw me another question.

"Alright, what about what Gamzee said earlier about your blood?" he snapped. I paused, shrugging again, feeling the knitted wool of my hat brush against my sensitive fins.

"I don't really care about the hemospectrum, so I never bothered getting anything the color of my blood. I could ask you the same thing if I gave a fuck you know." I replied, which actually shut Karkat up pretty fast. he recoiled almost, turning back and glaring at the TV screen and turning the movie back on, showing that the discussion was closed now.

The day faded into evening, and then late in the night before the two trolls finally decided it might be a good idea to go, but At that point I couldn't agree.

"You guys should probably spend the night at this point I said, yawning as they got ready to leave.

"What? no! FUCK no! Why in the fuck would we want to spend the night here?" Karkat shouted, loud as ever. I rubbed my forehead under my hat, pointing outside.

"Because the woods out there are full of pretty nasty things, and I'm not completely sure shit doesn't come crawling out of that lake at night either." I explained. Gamzee glanced outside, nodding and then shrugged at karkat with another goofy grin.

" Sis has got a point, motherfuckin' best friend. Let's just crash out here tonight and go home tomorrow."

"FUCK YOU GAMZEE. No, I do NOT want to crash here! We don't even have fucking recupracoons, and even though YOUR drugged ass doesn't need one, I fucking DO!" Karkat snarled, leaning in and glaring at Gamzee. I stood, starting to pick up my living room as I offered my solution.

"Karkat, just use mine. I can crash on the couch, it doesn't matter. trust me, I'm going to have trouble sleeping anyways, might as well let you get a decent amount of sleep. Fuck, I'll even make you guys breakfast tomorrow and lend you any of the romcoms you want when you go if it will calm you down." I tossed another empty faygo bottle and a smashed bag of chips into my shopping trash bag, watching Karkat glare from me to Gamzee and back, as if we had planned to make his night miserable.

"Fine." He finally snapped, storming upstairs to my room, where I had shown him and Gamzee earlier. Gamzee grinned, sighing contentedly.

"Thanks for letting us crash here sis. you sure it's alright for Karkat to use your Recoupracoon? I know most trolls have some wicked nasty nightmares when they don't sleep in those." I paused for a moment, remembering my dream from the previous night. I stiffled a shudder and looked up, shaking my head.

"Nah, it's alright."

* * *

Gamzee went to bed upstairs with some extra blankets I had lying around, and crashed in my room with Karkat, who I hadn't seen since he went storming upstairs in the first place. Yawning, I changed into a black tanktop and a pair of black gym shorts, loose and breathable material that was motherfuckin' comfortable. I crawled onto the couch and under my own blankets, still wearing my hat as I drifted into sleep.

I wish I could say they had been pleasant dreams.

skulls being smashed in. a scream. the white queen's mangled body being sliced in half. my house exploding in a fiery blaze. and screaming. all the screaming. . .

I woke up in a cold sweat, breathing hard and sitting bolt upright.

"Fuck!" I heard the clatter of plastic hitting the floor and glanced into my kitchen a few feet away to see Karkat staring back at me. He was shirtless, wearing black boxers, and his hair seemed to still be damp from the slime. water was all over the floor, so he must have been grabbing a drink when I woke up, and I had scared the fuck out of him and he dropped the cup. Taking a shaky breath, I slid off the couch and walked over towards the kitchen. Karkat seemed to recover quickly and become pissed, fumbling for something to dry the mess up with.

"What the fuck is your problem?" He snapped as I stepped into the kitchen. I didn't bother answering as I grabbed a hand towel and knelt to soak up the water. I think Karkat realized what he was wearing then, because I heard him mutter another quieter "Oh fuck. . ." and he quickly found his way to the other end of the kitchen. after a couple more seconds, I answered him.

"I didn't mind you taking the recoupracoon because I new I wasn't going to sleep well anyways. I always have nightmares." I said calmly, picking up the now cracked plastic cup. Karkat remained silent for a few more seconds, probably unsure of how to answer. When I glanced over at him he looked both uncomfortable and irritated, as well as maybe. . . a little sympathetic?

"Why the fuck would you have night-. . ." He began to mutter, but he froze in mid sentence as his eyes locked with mine in the pale light of the moon streaming through my window.

"You're eyes. . . you're not wearing that fucking hat. ." He pieced together. and he was right. my yellow eyes glowed back at him, but my pupils were different from his. one was the color of the golden prospit, the other the color of the purple derse. both glowed ever so slightly, projecting calm and gentle rays of purple and gold across my gaze. I had once been told the lights in my eyes lulled people into wanting to sleep, though I had never tested it. And then they followed up to where my ears had once been, and I would have laughed at his face if I wasn't so tired. He looked from the fins to my eyes and to the fins again, his jaw slightly hanging.

"Yeah, I know. I think I can trust you not to go shouting to Gamzee that my eyes have fucked up pupils and I have nightmares, right? Or, you know, the fins." I asked tiredly, breaking our staring contest as I refilled the water in the cup and offered it to Karkat again. As he reached for it he seemed to remember his lack of clothes, and I sensed he was blushing. I hid a weak smile as he took the cup, and then I sat myself on the counter top.

"So, I guess you couldn't sleep either?" I asked, if nothing than to make him less uncomfortable.

"Not when Gamzee sounds like a fucking giant bear coming to slash my face off in his sleep." Karkat muttered angrilly. I nodded, yawning.

"Well, you can hang out with me if you want to. I'm probaby not going to go back to sleep for a while." I offered, which was true. I glanced over and noticed Karkat's annoyed and maybe a little embaressed glare, and I broke into a small grin.

"Oh calm the fuck down Vantas. I am in no way interested in putting you in a redrom or blackrom quadrant, and something tells me the stoner clown upstairs is already you're moirail. Would it kill you to hang out down here until your tired again and watch whatever romantic comedy they have running on TV right now? or hell, you can just explain a few of them to me. I haven't watched many of them, about half of what I have, I watched tonight with you two." Karkat seemed to relax a little and then, sighing, he shrugged.

"Fuck it. yeah, alright, but give me a blanket. it's fucking cold down here." He growled.


	3. An awkward moment or two

_So I was just skimming through the chapters when I realized an entire section of the last chapter was missing. So I'm adding it. Maybe it's not the best idea for me to be updating things like this at one in the morning anymore? It seems to cause a lot of problems. . . anyways, a thousand apologies for the missing chunk of story, although honestly, it went by rather easilly unnoticed. just a bit of awkward fluff and making Karkat uncomfortable. because, you know, Terezi commands it and other reasons.~_

* * *

We spent the rest of the night, or really just the early morning, watching a couple of cheesy soap operas Karkat found. Apparently, he liked these about as much as his rom coms. Eventually, he had opted to go back to my room and grab his shirt from yesterday, instead of continuing to slouch, huddled in the blanket I had slept with wrapped around his shoulders. When he got back, he plopped down on the other end of the couch, sighing in that ever-present annoyed way.

"Gamzee's still asleep?" I asked, tossing him the remote. He nodded, catching it.

"yeah. . . he's fucking scary though. . . He talks in his sleep. . ." Karkat muttered, selecting another soap Opera marathon we had yet to watch. Currently we had watched three different soaps, and from what I could tell it was always the same series of plots, but with different characters.

As we settled in to endure another hour and a half of scandal and cheesy acting, I glanced over at Karkat. He seemed to be quickly absorbed into the program, which was good, since it meant he didn't notice me staring. I wasn't trying to be creepy or anything, it's just that I had thought of something. My horns were, technically, artificial. I had imagined them as anatomically correct as possible, but I had always wondered. . . were regular troll's horns sensitive? should I have adapted nerves into the base of my horns?Was that even a possibility at this point? What would happen . . . If I poked Karkat's nubby horns?

I considered it for a minute. Maybe it would be safer to wait for Gamzee to get up and just ask him. Then again, who knew when in the hell he was going to get up? Besides, I was bored now, and I wanted to know. So, I decided to find out and risk Karkat losing his shit. . .again.

He was still fixated on the TV as I lazily stretched my arms, subtly reaching over until my fingers were just inches from on of the brightly colored nubs poking out of his messy black hair. With a steady breath, I gingerly poked the tip of Karkat's horn, then clasped my hand around it.

Karkat's reaction was nigh instantaneous.  
"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?!" He snapped, going rigid and reflexively trying to jerk away. My hand stayed firmly clasped on his horn, much like a three year old with a new toy, and I blinked in surprise, a small grin starting to spread on my lips.

"I wanted to know if your horns were sensitive." I said simply as Karkat grabbed the wrist of my hand, trying to pull me off of his horn. Unfortunately for him, I had a rather strong grip.

"Yes, they're fucking sensitive you fucked up creep! Now let go! It's . . .argh!" He hissed, slamming a fist into my arm. Crap, that was probably going to bruise. But I was having way too much fun annoying Karkat to stop now. Impulsively, I swung my other hand and grasped Karkat's other horn, running my pointer finger from the base to the tip and back, testing how Karkat reacted. It was more scientific study on troll anatomy than trying to be awkward. Okay, and watching Karkat panic was kind of funny too.

His reaction was priceless. He froze, in mid swing, and I could just see the shiver going through him. If trolls could blush, he probably was right now, but it was hard to tell when the only source of light in the room was coming from the TV. It seemed he was fighting with what to do, maybe unsure of if he liked this or not, and certainly pissed at me for putting him in this situation.

"Let. . .go.. . . of my. . .fucking. . .horns." He growled finally, glaring furiously at me. I think it pissed him off more that I was in no way embarrassed by the current situation, and that I was actually enjoying his awkwardness. I responded by gently scratching around the base of his left horn with one of my nails, which caused him to make a small sound in the back of his throat. it might have been a growl, or a whimper. I never really decided. he seemed to be fighting a losing battle with himself, because clearly he enjoyed this, like a dog enjoys having it's ears scratched. Or a cat. a Kar-Cat.

"Why don't you just let yourself relax?" I asked casually, scratching his horn again. Karkat stiffened a little. Somehow, I had accidentally pissed him off. . again.

"Why don't you let go!" He hissed, lunging at me, in an attempt to push me away and get me to let go. the problem was where he shoved me.

His hand came in contact with my boob. which was unfortunate, since I had done a damn good job of keeping those out of sight and mind so far. the problem was, they were kind of. . big. At least, as far as trolls go. Since I was always wearing my jacket, they just kind of blended into the rest of me and looked . . .regular sized. and since it was dark in the room and Karkat wasn't a pervert as far as I knew, I doubt he had been checking me out while my jacket had been off. and now, we were frozen in a really awkward moment, with Karkat's hand groping my boob and both my hands firmly attached to his horns, and our eyes locked in a moment of awkward silence.

and then Karkat lost his shit.  
He jerked his hand away from me, and I was still stunned enough for him to wriggle out of my grip and to the opposite side of the couch, then off the couch and storming into the bathroom. I heard him slam the door and sighed.  
Yep, he was definitely blushing.

* * *

It took half an hour of waiting before He came back out. I was still watching the soap he had left running, it could almost seem like nothing had happened. except. . .Karkat couldn't let things go very well. He stormed in front of the TV, glaring at me with unmistakable, absolute HATE. Platonic hate, but HATE nonetheless.

"What. . the fuck. . .is wrong with you?" He snarled, his teeth clenched. "You don't even look like anything happened! How in the fuck do you do that? I swear, you just fucking love making me look like some god damn wriggler, don't you? making the whole room fucking full of tension and acting like there's not a god damn thing wrong! Fuck, you're almost as bad as Gamzee, I swear!" He ranted, swinging his arms for added effect.  
"I mean.. . . fuck, I've known you for maybe three days and you've made a point to make me look like an idiot half of the fucking time! Do you hate me or something? is this how you get your enjoyment, making people you meet miserable? Do you not have any fucking friends who will tolerate you, and That's why you knock over random fucking strangers? to make friends, you god damn Freak!" he spat out the last word, seething.

It's funny though, watching his reaction when he actually took a look at my face right then. he was still pissed for sure, but now he was confused too.  
I had a bittersweet smile on my face, or what you could see of it, since I had put my hat back on while Kar had been in the bathroom.

"Actually, I. . .used to have a lot of friends. I guess. . . I forgot we had just met a few days ago. I'm so comfortable around you guys, I forget I probably can't joke around and annoy you as much as I could with someone I've known for a while." I paused for a moment, staring at my hands in my lap. Freak. that word was a trigger for me. It was a word that always managed to make me shut down, no matter what my mood was beforehand, especially when it was meant to be an insult.

"Sorry." I mumbled quietly.

The room went Silent for a while. Karkat clearly hadn't been expecting an apology, Or the sudden change in mood, and now he wasn't sure what to do. He sighed angrily, rubbing his temple and stepping out of the way of the TV, storming into the kitchen.

"You're fucking cheating." He muttered after minutes of silence.

"I can't even fucking yell at you for mentally scarring me for life when you actually apologize. " He growled, anger still seething in his voice. I heard him getting a cup of water, and a few seconds later he came back and sat down next to me on the couch. We sat in silence for a while before he spoke.

"I feel. . . Like I should know you from somewhere, but I can't remember. You seem too comfortable, you don't judge anything that me or Gamzee have said since we got here. . . It just seems like you've been around us a fuck of a lot longer than three days." He finally said, speaking slowly, tiredly. a tingle went up my own spine this time.

'That's because I've been around for years' I thought to myself. I had watched their entire session. I had watched him and the others grow up for a little while even. Only a little, but enough. I didn't say anything though, and eventually, Karkat sighed again.

"If you swear. . if you fucking swear to Gog you'll never tell anyone. . . I'll let you mess with my horns again." Karkat left the sentence in the air for a while. We both knew now that he had enjoyed me messing with his horns as much as I had enjoyed watching him freak out. quietly, I smiled.

"If I ever say a word, you have the right to steal my hat and show everyone my eyes and or fins." I promised, grinning a little.

"you know, that's not much of a payback. I have a couple of other friends with eyes just as weird as yours you know. Fuck, one of my best friends eyes are solid red and solid blue." I paused, considering the thought. he was right, sollux and Terezi both had oddly colored eyes.

"huh. . . maybe someday I can harass them too." I muttered, yawning a bit. the soap we had begun watching a while ago was coming to it's end, and the sun was going to be coming up in half an hour or so. Well, what constituted as a sun on Alternia anyway. more of a dim grey lighting. Karkat yawned back at me and sighed, probably as tired as I was. he tipped his head, considering where to rest it, when I reached over and started rubbing his horn between my fingers. he froze up at the contact for a few moments, but then relaxed, deciding to lay his head on my lap and curl into a ball, just letting me play with his nubby horns, rather than argue. By the little muttering sounds he made and the way he rubbed his horns against the palms of my hands every once in a while, he clearly, secretly, enjoyed this.

I wondered when Karkat had last let himself actually enjoy something, instead of always being tense and angry. It couldn't be good for anyone's health to always be upset over something like that. He probably didn't get much sleep either, with the bags under his eyes. Did he have nightmares too? What were they about? I knew his blood color was a mutant one, a shunned one, amoungst his race. Did he worry about what others would think of him if they knew the color of the blood flowing through his veins?

as a movie came on, a rom com we had actually just watched yesterday, I began to hear Karkat's breathing relax, and I realized he had been so comfortable he had fallen asleep. I smiled quietly, carefully stroking his little nubs. It was a moment like this that made bad memories a little less vivid in my mind. And, maybe his too.

* * *

_~Just as a head up, this is less of a romance theme and more of an awkward encounters kind of thing. I promise your ships are safe! I won't sink them with my OC! OrI'll try not to at least. She just likes everyone to be happy. Like. . .the ultimate austispice for everyone. and back up moirail. and extra Lusus. All in one, without the actual titles to go with the jobs. Because she's weird like that. comments or complaints? feel free to review._

..


	4. Breakfast at Volpes

_Prepare for the unholy wrath of Karkat in rage mode! and breakfast of course._

* * *

Gamzee woke up earlier than I figured a stoner troll would. he was up about two hours after the sun had rose, and I heard him shuffling around upstairs. I looked down at Karkat, who's head was still using my lap as a pillow. I smiled, it was the first time I had seen the guy so peaceful. Hell, he was starting to drool a little. not that I really minded, it was good at least one of us had gotten back to sleep. Still, I figured he didn't want Gamzee to find him asleep on my lap, so I decided to wake him up.

"Hey. . .Karkat. . . you probably want to get up now." I said, poking his cheek a couple of times. I heard his breathing pause, and he slowly opened one eye. he then opened the other, blinking and trying to sit up a little too quickly. He slid, and almost fell off the couch, but I managed to help him stay upright.

"What the. . .when did I fall asleep?" He asked, sounding annoyed. he shook his head, rubbing a hand over his face, as if he was trying to wipe the sleep away.

"about two hours ago. I figured I would let you sleep, since I gave you enough trouble earlier. Gamzee's getting up though, and I figured you would rather let him think we've just been up for a while." I explained, getting up from the couch and walking in to the kitchen. I had been wearing my hat since Karkat's blow out earlier, so I didn't worry about Gamzee. Instead, I started rifling through my fridge, looking for something to cook the two trolls that were going to be demanding their promised food soon. As per usual, Zen and Nez didn't fail to deliver. two different kinds of bread, a carton of eggs, some more strange fruits, a couple of bagels, some strips of what I assumed was bacon, but probably not from a pig, and various other things were neatly lining the shelves. I grinned, picking up the eggs, the bread with seeds in it, some butter, and the mystery bacon. I heard Karkat flipping through the channels in the other room while I started the stove, picking a pan out from under a cupboard and placing it on the burner. I started buttering a slice of bread when I heard Gamzee stumbling down the stairs and walking into the living room.

"what's up, motherfuckin' best friend? Am I the last one up?" He asked, poking his head into the kitchen to see me.

"Yeah dumbass. Both of us have been up for at least an hour." Karkat replied in his usual snarky tone as he settled on some reality show I'd never heard of. Gamzee walked into the kitchen, opening my fridge and grinning as he grabbed one of the remaining unopened bottles of faygo in there.

"Fuckin' magic." He muttered, downing a couple mouthfuls of the stuff before focusing on me. I had opted to make something I doubt they had seen on Alternia, it had been something I learned when I was a human. It was called an egg in a nest, and it was where you poked a hole in your bread, buttered both sides of it, then cooked it in your frying pan. you would crack an egg and try to land the yolk in the bread hole, and cook your egg pretty much inside the bread. If you wanted to be really cool, which I was, you break bits of bacon up and spread them on the bread, to that it cooked right into the egg when the whole thing heated up. Gamzee watched as I cracked my egg, landing it perfectly without even breaking the yolk.

"Morning sis. Sleep good last night? Hey, what are you motherfuckin' making anyway?" He asked, tilting his head a little. I flipped the nest over, letting the egg white side cook now before I answered.

"It's called an 'egg in a nest', and it's something I learned to make a long time ago. pretty much, you cook and egg and some bacon into a piece of bread, but you can still taste all the seperate flavors." I rambled, already starting another one. "They only take a couple of minutes to cook, and they don't take much to make, so they're pretty good to make for a lot of people."

Gamzee seemed to have zoned out for a second, staring at the pan, but I could see a huge grin growing on his face as he turned towards he living room, and shouted "Karkat! We're going to be eating motherfuckin' miracles for breakfast!" To which we both received a string of cuss words generally implying Karkat didn't give a fuck. I laughed a little as I finished the first nest, handing it to Gamzee on a plate with a fork.

"there's fruit in the fridge too if you want it." I said as he cut into the edge of his now well toasted bread. I pointed to the middle and explained how you dipped your bread into the egg yolk as you ate, to which he simply grinned like crazy, totally convinced I was some kind of magic witch and that he was eating a motherfuckin' miracle for breakfast. I guess Karkat actually did give a fuck, because he walked into the kitchen just as I finished a second nest, and took the food with only a few muttered complaints about how it looked fucking weird as hell, and that I shouldn't press my freakish taste in food on others. I knew he didn't mind my 'freakish tastes' though, since both him and Gamzee came back for seconds. . . and fourths. I didn't really mind all too much though. It had been a while since I had bothered to make these actually. It was nice, cooking for people again.

I finally managed to make my own breakfast, somewhere inbetween the fourth and fifth servings I made for Gamzee. It was insane how much the guy could eat. I was pretty sure Karkat would have stopped eating after his second serving, but he had secretly wanted to out-eat Gamzee. He gave up after the fourth egg in a nest though, clearly full waaay past his limit. I pointed to the fridge and told him there was some juice in there if he wanted it, which he grudgingly went and dug out.

I sat up on the counter top, just digging in to my breakfast as Gam finished off his fifth, leaning back and letting out a loud, contented belch. "That was motherfuckin' magical Sis. You gotta show me how to make those breakfast miracles." He said, causing me to laugh. Breakfast miracles. I swore I was going to coin that term.

"Don't you have any idea how disgusting . . .*urp*. . that was Gamzee? You just ate like half the shit in her fridge, and now we're stuck smelling that disgusting belch air you just puked out." Karkat growled. I realized he was trying to hold down his own breakfast, clearly having eaten too much. I sighed shaking my head, and finished off my own breakfast before walking over to the fridge and digging out some seltzer water from the fridge. I put that on the counter, then opened up a small drawer in the door of the fridge and pulled out a chunk of ginger, as well as some green tea leaves. Zen and Nez new exactly where to get the best herbs, tea leaves, and roots in the woods, they never disapointed. I boiled some water in the microwave, beginning to crush the ginger while I waited.

"Hey Sis, what kind of miracle you cooking up now?" Gamzee asked, leaning over my shoulder. I could smell the faygo on his breath, he clearly didn't notice my personal space bubble. But, it was Gamzee, it's not like he was going to do anything that alarming.

"I'm making something for Karkat's stomach." I said as the microwave went off. I caught a glimpse of Karkat's indignant face opening up to shout and arguement. "And before you start protesting, I promise it won't kill you. It actually tastes pretty good." I added, and watched with a bit of satisfaction as he stubornly shut his trap. I opened the microwave, sliding around Gamzee, and pulled out my tiny cup of water. I dropped the green tea leaves into it, and the juices quickly began turning the water green. I put the ginger I had smashed up into a tea strainer and strained the green tea through it, giving it the ginger flavor. To finish the process, I poured the highly concentrated green ginger tea into a larger glass, and diluted it with the seltzer water. If you've ever had Canada dry green tea ginger ale, that's pretty much what this was. I had learned to make it myself after some expirementing, and this was as close as I could get to the original.

"Here." I said, offering Karkat the light green, fizzy drink. I laughed at his disgusted reaction, and lifted the glass to my lips, taking a sip. "See? I drink this all the time. It helps your stomach when it's upset." I explained.

"I don't give a fuck you fucking hedge witch! there's no way your getting me to drink that sh-*URP*. . . " Karkat had to cover his mouth as a bit of bile made it's way up his throat. he coughed a bit, grabbing the glass from my hands and tilting his head back, swallowing a mouthful of my makeshift green tea ginger ale. Either his stomach was really upset or he didn't absolutely hate the flavor, because he drank almost half the glass before he slammed it on the counter. he wiped his mouth and glared at me with his constantly angry exspression.

Gamzee clearly didn't notice the growing tension. "Well man? does your stomach fell better?" He asked, his eyes wide with wonder. I was just blowing his mind with all these motherfuckin' miracles this morning.

After a while, Karkat Grudgingly nodded. "I don't feel like puking my fucking guts out anymore, if that's what you wanted to fucking hear." He growled. Gamzee almost dropped his faygo.

"Sis, your motherfuckin' magical! Do you know the mirthful messiahs or something? Shit man, you have to show me how to do this shit." He rambled, convinced now that I was epic. If I had known making friends with Gamzee was going to be as easy as making breakfast and curing a stomach ache, I would have gone looking for him my first week in Alternia.

I was still grinning when Karkat snapped. "What the fuck _are_ you?" He snarled, causing me to look at him with confusion. "You know shit that you couldn't have just fucking learned on your own. You fight too well, you know too much shit, and you just fucking showed up here. Fuck, you don't even have your blood color on your clothes! your not like us, your a fucking freak, so what the fuck are you?" He snarled. He looked furious, but I didn't know why. I couldn't figure out what the hell I'd done. the kitchen was silent. It looked like even Gamzee was in shock. and Karkat just stood there, glaring at both of us and huffing in and out. He looked like he could've punched something.

"I. . ." I closed my mouth. I guess it was expected. Even on Alternia, I was weird. "Sorry." I muttered. My face must have looked pretty pathetic right then, because I could see Karkat starting to regret what he had just said. he looked angry and confused. He opened his mouth to say something, but I cut him off.

"I'm going to go look for my Lususes, k? I think they should be coming home today. . .Don't wait for me to get back, alright? just grab the movies you wanted and go when you feel like leaving." I managed to ramble out. Then, before either of them could respond, I forced a pathetic smile and slid out of the kitchen and up the stairs, quickly running to my room to change into something I could smash shit in.

I put on my usual jacket, a black T-shirt with my symbol, and some black jeggings. this would make it easy to hide in the shadows in the woods. pulling my hat a little lower over my eyes, I sighed tiredly. a long time ago, someone who I respected shouting at me like that would have definetely caused me to cry, now that I was alone and out of sight. But I had learned between then and now that tears, whether someone could see them or not, were still a sign of weakness, and crying still made you feel pathetic. So I picked up my twin blades, I grabbed my tube of strife glowsticks, and I opened my door to hear an arguement downstairs.

"Fuck off you stupid fuck! I'll say whatever the fuck I want!" Karkat was shouting.

"That wasn't cool and you know it Motherfucker. All she's done since we got here is lend us shit, let us do what we want, and fuckin' feed us. Shit man, you wanted to come here to kick the fuck out of her for just pinning you." Gamzee argued back, sounding a little upset, which might as well have been yelling for a stoner like him. I was frozen on his words though. Karkat had come here yesterday for payback?

"If I hadn't shown up at your motherfuckin' hive, you would have come here and gotten your ass kicked too. Fuck, instead we ended up watching a marathon of your motherfuckin' romcoms and YOU ended up sleeping in her Recupracoon. She probably didn't sleep at all last night, and yet she fuckin' woke up today, let you hog the TV, and made us a motherfuckin' magical feast. and you fuckin' thanked her by callin' her a freak?" Gamzee paused for a minute. My spine tingled, because he almost sounded angry at this point. Maybe I should go down there and calm them down? I had watched Gamzee in semi-rage mode, and I really didn't want to see it first hand. but then I heard him sigh, and he seemed to have relaxed. I heard another Faygo bottle open with a fresh fizz. "That wasn't cool motherfucker, and you know it."

Gamzee's arguement was left hanging in the air. the entire house was silent for a couple of minutes.

"Shut the Fuck up Gamzee. you don't even know what your talking about, your fucking high on your god damn sophor slime!" Karkat finally growled, but he didn't seem into it. I heard a crash, and guessed someone had knocked the dishes on the counter to the floor. "Just shut the fuck up!"

I decided I had eavesdropped enough. I had a feeling like the lump people get in their throats had slithered it's way into my stomach, and now it was festering in there. I turned and opened my bedroom window, sliding out and dropping to the ground, about three stories below. Heights had used to scare me, but not so much anymore. I walked out towards the woods, and as I entered the tree line, I heard Gamzee's voice in my room, calling around for me. by the time he looked out the window, I had faded into the forest shadows.


	5. strange meetings in the woods

I didn't go home that evening. I knew Gamzee would probably wait around for hours, hoping I would show up, but I also knew Karkat would go home before dark, and Gamzee'd go with him. So I waited, running through the trees, catching and releasing birds, and giving any creature with the balls to fight me a couple of nasty battle scars. I hadn't seen any indication of Zen or Nez being around since yesterday morning, so I decided to look for them when the sun began setting. We had dug dozens of fox hollows in these woods, just in case the hive was destroyed, and I had my choice of sleeping in any number of them tonight, after I found one of my Lususes.

I wandered farther into the forest than I usualy preffered to patrol, trying to get my mind off of Karkat and Gamzee. After that, I doubted I would get another chance to talk with either of them.

Freak. He'd called me that twice. and it hurt. I hadn't thought too much about the troll's hemospectrum either. I guess it wasn't normal to keep your blood a secret? but then, didn't Karkat keep his a secret? I mean, I suppose he was a special case and all, but. . . .

Sighing, I shook my head. Clearly it would have done me good to study more on troll culture before I had talked to anyone. . .even though I had studied a lot. Or tried to.

I was still deep in my own miserable thoughts when I heard something that froze me. A loud, desperate snarl. One that I recognized. It was Nez's growl. I was flying through the forest's thickets and undergrowth, silent as a shadow and faster than the wind around me. my blades were drawn as the sun reached the earth, just beginning to set. I burst into a clearing in combat mode, glancing at Nez's form a few yards away, a three clawed gash on his shoulder. I glanced at his line of sight and saw a blur of blue and green flying towards him. I instinctively lunged forward, slamming the flat side of my blade into the assailing creature and sending it flying to the other end of the clearing, then crouching, waiting for my opponent's move.

"mrrrrow. . . .ouch. . ." I paused, blinking. letting my guard slip a little, I realized I knew this . . .troll. Nepeta Leijon lay on her side, rubbing her stomach where I had hit her. I shook my head, setting my swords down. Great. I'd just beaten up a cat. Equius' moirail cat.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to hit that hard. . ." I apologized, crouching a few feet away. "It was either that or get sliced in half though, since all I've got on me are my swords."

Nepeta blinked, sitting up and staring at me. "Oh. . .is that. . was I. . .Is that your Lusus I was attacking?" Nepeta asked, her pupils dialating in the darkening light. She began sheething her blue claws, adjusting her own kitty hat as she watched me with a feline fascination.

"Yeah, one of them. He's got a brother somewhere around here." I explained, offering Nepeta a hand up, which she accepted. Nez growled angrily, probably asking me what the hell I thought I was doing making nice with the girl that had almost gutted him. I had a feeling Zen was the master behind this little incident, as usual.

"Oh my goodness. . .This is purrrfectly pawful! I thought he was wild, since he's just been wandering around the woods all day. I'm sorry for almost gutting him." Nepeta apologized, looking embarressed. "ooh. . . Equius would never let me hear the end of it if he found out I killed someone's Lusus. . ." she muttered, shaking her head back and forth, as if trying to shake the idea. My heart skipped a beat at the mention of Equius. I was suddenly glad my hat covered half my face.

"Equius? is that. . .your Lusus?" I asked, playing dumb. I'm not supposed to know who the strong, robot building troll was. Not yet at least. Nepeta looked up, shaking her head again, but now she was grinning.

"Of course not! Equius is my moirail! Most people think he's scary or weird, but he's actually really . . well, he's really nice to me anyway." Nepeta said, laughing again. she looked up, studying me for a minute, and then her smile widened. "Oh wow! Your hat has ears! they're like your Lusus! That's like me and my hat, but my Lusus is a cat, which fits me purrectly well. But. . .Can you see?" She asked, tilting her head. It was my turn to grin, and I nodded.

"Yeah, I can see through some gaps in the knitting. and your the first person in a while to see the resmblance." I turned back to Nez, whose wound was quickly healing as he glared at us. Clearly he'd come to the same conclusion as I had about Zen setting him up for this to happen. I turned back to Nepeta with a grin. "My name's Volpes. What about you?"

"Nepeta." Nepeta replied, looking up. she frowned a bit. "It's getting kind of dark. . . do you live around here?" she asked me. I shrugged, then shook my head. Actually, I was a couple of miles out from my hive at this point. the closest fox hollow was about half a mile south, and it would be problematic finding the entrance to it in the dark.

"I live. . .over by the lake at the other end of the forest. I've been exploring out here and trying to find him, and his brother." I explained, nodding at Nez. which, was _kind of_ true. Nepeta looked at me thoughtfully, then nodded decidingly.

"my cave is only a little ways away. Since I attacked you, and it's a long way back to your hive, why don't you and your Lusus stay with me tonight and go home in the morning?" She offered. I blinked, considering. Zen, you clever bastard. I started to grin, nodding.

"Sure. sounds like fun."

and so I made another furriend.

Nepeta and I had a lot in common as it turned out. we took after our Lususes, wore hats, hunted in the woods, worked with two weapons,wore jackets, and we both liked to rp. Although, she liked online and live action, while I just liked online. We ended up writing a roleplay together, and eventually Nepeta brought up F.L.A.R.

"Equius won't let me play it because he says it's dangerous, and, I guess it is. . . I mean, Tavros can't walk because of that one incident. . . but still, it looked like fun!" Nepeta complained, her eyes glaring in a pout-ish way.

"Tavros? who's that? what happened to him?" I asked, genuinely concerned. I knew who Tavros was, but I had never been able to find the point in his timeline where he'd lost his ability to walk. It was clearly not a memory anyone wanted to dream about. sighing, Nepeta explained about Tavros Nitram, and then Vriska Serket, and how Vriska had pretty much knocked him off a cliff because he wouldn't stand up to her. my face twisted into a grimance at the end of the story, and Nepeta seemed to notice the change in mood. she tilted her head.

"Volpes? Is something wrong?" She asked.

"This. . Vriska. she's a manipulative little bully from the sound of it. and I really don't like bullies." I replied. Nez opened one eye from the corner where he had been laying with Nepeta's cat Lusus, studying me for a moment before falling asleep again. Nepeta was studying me too, but she had a grin growing on her face.

"I bet you could kick her butt in FLARPing." she said. her suggestion broke my mood, and I looked at her in confusion. "I can't FLARP, but you can. That wasn't the only thing Vriska's done you know, she's purractically made it so no one can beat her at FLARPing by taking out the other good players!" And so Nepeta went on to explain about terezi and Aradia as well, which upset me even more since this meant Vriska used other people, people who_ cared _about the victims, to do her dirty work. And I didn't like it.

" But you, I bet you could beat her in a one-on-one match! Actually, I think her and Eridan are enemies again, maybe you could join Eridan in a FLARP match against her!" Nepeta suggested, getting excited now. "And then you can tell me all about it, so I can pretend I was FLARPing with you!"

Now this was an idea. I could beat the bully at her own game. and. . wait, had she said Eridan? I didn't know if I wanted to be on a team with him or not. I was good at fighting on my own, but I might get distracted with him watching. . . Or I might just be motivated enough to kick Vriska's ass into next week.

"That sounds. . .Like a purrrfectly clawsible situation." I purred, grinning devilishly. "Now then, tell me about this Eridan guy. . ."

the night went on with Nepeta explaining everything I already knew about Eridan. His Kismesis thing with Vriska, his Moirailship and possible redrom crush on Feferi, she explained who Fef was, and then proceeded to show me her shipping wall, explaining all of her, and she assured me soon to be our, friend's different relationships and possible quadrants. Eridan liked Fef but she wasn't interested in him that way, she might even stop being his moirail soon, Fef actually kind of liked sollux, who might like her back but maybe not because he still cared about Aradia and he was still dealing with killing her, and then that opened up the whole thing of were they just moirails or had they been something more. . .flushed?

in the end, most of what I got was that shipping walls were confusing, there was a lot of relationships I had to be aware of, Nepeta was a great person to get and give info to, and that Eridan was a hipster who was set on killing all landwellers. I sighed. It seemed I might end up playing group Therapist to a lot of people someday soon.


	6. flarping ftw

Nepeta, with Equius and Terezi's help, set it up that it would be me and Eridan against Vriska and Kanaya in two days. At least, that had been the plan. but then Vriska got ahold of it and twisted Eridan around so that it was him and her against just me. Nepeta was fuming to me about it on Trollian, promising to fix the set up for me, but I declined. No. . . this was perfect. I told Nepeta that it was fine, I would see her the next day, when we held the match. after a bit of concerned arguing, she gave in and logged off Trollian.

Sighing, I leaned back against the wall in my room. It had been a day and a half since I had been at Nepeta's house. when I had gotten home, Zen was asleep on the deck, and it seemed like he had been cleaning the house. I found several broken dishes in the trash and figured that it must have been Karkat. He hadn't even bothered to talk to me on Trollian so far, but Gamzee definetely had. He'd left me a note saying sorry for Karkat being an ass, and telling me if I ever wanted to I could come chill at his house and we could slam some faygos, the 'wicked elixer' as he liked calling it. I had written him back saying it sounded cool, and told him not to worry abou Karkat, that I held nothing against the guy and that I was in fact, a weird motherfucker. Gamzee tried to, I think make me feel better, but I assured him everything was chill and that he should just chill with a faygo.

If I wasn't so lazy, Maybe I would pull up the Trollian logs, but I'm actually looking forward to explaining my first FLARPing session, so you got two days crammed into about three paragraphs instead.

Vengance is sweet. so is kicking a couple of snobs off their high horsed thrones. I got to do both in one day, as well as make both new enemies and friends. In other words, I had used a day's worth of time pretty effectively.

Nepeta met me at my hive early the morning of the game. I was wearing the same outfit today as I had been the day I met Karkat. Honestly, I only really rotated between three different outfits, and they all were the same except for the pants. Shorts were good to relax in, jeggings were good to run through the woods in, but grey jeans were best when I needed to fight. And I had a feeling I was going to be doing a bit of combat before the day was through. Nepeta came pounding on my door that morning and I opened it up to find an extra surprise standing there with her.

"Good morning Volpes! Ready to go?" Nepeta's cheery voice came floating through my ears, but my focus wasn't on her. It was on the troll standing imaptiently at the foot of my deck, towel in hand. He was sweating a bit, and his glasses were cracked, but just the sight of him was going to make my face go a dark shade of purple-ish if I wasn't careful.

"Oh, this is Equius by the way! He's the one I was telling you about yesterday. He's kind of protective, so he wouldn't let me come all the way here by myself, even though _I TOLD HIM IT WAS FINE!" _Nepeta turned and shouted the last part down towards where Equius stood, barely bothering to glance up at us.

"Oh. . .uh, alright." I mumbled. Gog I must have sounded like an idiot. I shook my head and focussed on the job ahead. acting like an air head would get me nowhere, except maybe dead if I fucked up in the game today. "Alright. So, Where are we headed? I can ride Zen if we need to get there fast, and I doubt Nez would mind if I asked him to carry you."

"Nah, thats alright. I rode here on my Lusus, and Equius is so stong he just jogged here." I raised an eyebrow at that, but Nepeta continued. "We're going to Equius' hive first. Vriska lives right by his place, and she said the game was going to be at her Hive."

I nodded, starting to grin as I stepped down the stairs and off the deck, standing a few feet from Equius. "So, I guess your leading the way then. Nep's probably told you already, but my name's Volpes. Thanks for coming all the way out here with Nepeta, It's a long ways from my hive to hers, and probably a lot longer from where you live to here." I said, smiling but only half looking at him. I couldn't tell if he was looking at me or not, since his broken shades hid his eyes. I guess most people must have had the same problem with me, with my hat covering half my face and all.

"It is. Follow me." He stated simply. Or, ordered I suppose. He started marching back towards the tree line, and I glanced back at Nepeta to see her already climbing on to her large cat Lusus. Zen seemed to appear out of nowhere, and I shrugged and climbed onto his back. We made good time, between the speed of the Lususes and Equius. we were at his giant, castle-style hive in about an hour or so, and as I took in the location, I could see another similiarly built hive across the canyon, which was linked to this side by some giant, doomsday-esk machine.

_'That's Vriska's hive then. . .' _I thought to myself as I slid off of Zen's back. I noticed a white creature coming out of equius' hive to greet us, carrying three glasses of. . what I guessed was milk, on a silver tray. as he got closer, I recognized him to be Eq's Lusus, a musclebeast.

"good morning Aurthour!" Nepeta called, bounding over to the musclebeast and grabbing one of the glasses of his tray. equius took a second one, nodding curtly at his Lusus before raising the glass to his lips. . . and breaking it. glass and milk spilled down his front and he made a sound similiar to a cat hissing, his shades slipping down his nose a bit. I stiffled a bit of laughter in my throat as I walked over, taking the third glass from Aurthour's tray, but offering it to Equius.

"er, If this was meant for me, you can have it instead. you ran here after all, I can wait for another drink later." I offered, smiling, but not using my usual devilish grin. after glaring at me for half a minute, Equius reached out and took the drink from my hand. . .and then accidentally broke it, spilling milk over both of us.

"fiddlesticks!" He snapped, as if it was a cuss word.

"Equius! You should be more careful! Now look what you've done!" Nepeta chided, frowning with that childish pout she seemed to pull off so well.

"No, no. It's cool. I can soak most of this up. . .Do you have any towels lying around?" I asked, smiling a little awkwardly. Nepeta rolled her eyes and mumbled something about having them lying everywhere. Equius nodded, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a clean hand towel, offering it to me. I noticed with a little surprise that he was starting to sweat. I pressed the fresh towel against my jacket, and then down the front of my pants, managing to soak up all but a bit of the milk that had gotten on me. I had to hope what little there was left wasn't going to smell bad later.

"thanks. . .here. ." I offered the towel back, but realized Equius had already been wiping the sweat and milk off himself with. . . a back up hand towel? Well, I guess it was logical. from what I had seen so far, Equius seemed to have incidents like this a lot. When he finished wiping off, he reached out and took back the towel I had used. he opened his mouth, as if considering saying something, but thought better of it and turned to face Nepeta, who was already bouncing towards the castle like hive. He followed after her, with me in pursuit. I glanced back to see Zen, but found he had, as usual, disappeared for now. He had a habbit of doing that.

We ended up hanging out around Equius' house for an hour or so, waiting for Eridan to arrive at Vriska's place, as well as a few other guests that Nepeta had invited to watch the game, probably against Equius' orders, from the looks of it. So far, Terezi, Tavros, and Kanaya were the the only others showing up. heh, I say only, but it seemed like I was going to be meeting most of the twelve sgrub players today.

Nepeta got a message on Trollian from Vriska, saying they were ready on her end to start. the rules were simple; there were ten FLARPing bats hidden throughout her hive. I had to steal all ten of them before sundown and retun to my base, in other words Eq's hive. Her and Eridan would be defending at all times, but if I was able to I could take them out. Despite Nepeta's protests, I had a grin on my face. I liked these settings quite a bit actually. This was going to be fun.

The others showed up as I was heading towards the canyon. Vriska and Eridan were with them, probably coming to see what kind of weakling Nepeta had set against them. oooh, were they in for a surprise.

"So, you must 8e our apponent today! I hope you're good, it's 8een so loooooooong since I've had a good challenge." Vriska started off, looking down at me with a badly hidden sneer. I nodded, grinning in return.

"If your Vriska or Eridan, I definitely am. Lovely hive you've got set up, I look forward to ransacking it." I replied cooly, glancing towards the boy standing a little behind her. my heart skipped a beat, but only one, as I looked over to Eridan Ampora. I glanced at his purple cape, his many golden rings, his hipster-style glasses. . .Holy shit he was just begging to be mugged. I looked forward to taking the job too. See, I've got this nasty habbit of stealing stuff from people I happen to like. It's almost a term of endearment, or it would be if they didn't find it annoying as hell.

"We'll see a8out that. You'll have to get through the front door 8efore you even have a chance at getting the targets, let alone ransacking my hive." Vriska replied, still sneering, but maybe not looking so far down her nose at me anymore. I shrugged casually, turning my attention to the others, soon to be my spectators.

"Let's see if I can guess who's who here. . ." I muttered aloud. I pointed to Terezi. "You're Terezi, since you've got epic red glasses and the cane." Terezi's face lit up in a devilish grin much like my own, giving me a thumbs up. Grinning in return, I turned to Kanaya. "Which means you must be Kanaya. I like the skirt by the way. It goes well with the jade green lipstick, in a way." Kanaya responded with a cool and approving nod. I could tell these two and me were going to get along well. I turned to the last person I had yet to address, The nervous looking troll in the wheel chair. I walked over to where he was, looking at his lap and trying, it seemed, to avoid everyone's gaze.

"Hey." I said quietly, trying not to startle him. He looked up, a little unnerved anyways. "I think you must be. . .Tavros?" I guessed, although I knew the answer. I smiled kindly down at him, a little amused as he looked back at me, my hat mainly, with a little bit of wonder.

"uuh, yeah. thats me. I think its, uh, nice to meet you." He mumbled. I think he found it easier to look at me, since he couldn't see my eyes, and instead focussed on my hat. He offered me a nervous and friendly smile, as if hoping we might get along.

"heheh, I'm Volpes. I guess you came to watch me kick those two to the curb at FLARPing then?"I asked. Tavros glanced nervously over at Vriska. I tilted my head, noticing her glaring at us in the corner if my eye. I grinned and waved at her, which only caused her to give me an even more vicious death glare. I turned back to Tavros, who now seemed a little bit scared. "Don't worry, I promise she won't bother you. She'll be too busy dealing with me to cause you any trouble." I whispered, reassurring him with a confident grin. Tavros looked at me with a bit of wonder, but nodded, a small grin starting to grow on his own face.

I nodded once more before turning back to Vriska ane Eridan, now grinning devilishly. "Alrighty then. I'll give you two a ten minute head start to get set up, then I'm heading over." I announced. I was glad neither of them argued, but I did get some nasty glares from Vriska as they headed back towards her side of the canyon. as they walked off, I watched Eridan glance back at me, but I couldn't read his facial expression from that distance.

At the ten minute mark, I turned and waved at the others, then began racing towards the edge of the Canyon. At this point, sundown was about two hours away. Vriska clearly didn't think too highly of me, giving me that much time. They had allowed Lusus use in this game, and I soon felt Zen's padding feet racing behind me. I had been packing my swords on my back, and a tube of 40 strife glowsticks. Oh, how I fucking loved those things. I cracked open the bottle as I ran, breaking out 20 of the sticks and snapping them, activating the glowing magic in each one. I connected them into four rings of five, letting two sets hang from my waist and two from my neck. they were all made symetrically similar, each starting with a purple stick, then a blue one, then a bright green one, then orange, and ending with red.

When I reached the edge of the canyon I didn't stop, I simply jumped onto one of the chains holding the doomsday machine over the canyon and ran along it and onto Vriska's side. I surveyed my situation now. Eridan was charging to meet me on his own Lusus, a giant, floating, white seahorse. He held Ahabs crosshairs in his hands, and seemed to be getting a lock on me. at the same time, I felt something. . . no, someone, trying to needle their way into my mind. This was clearly Vriska, trying to cheat. A large grin split across my face now, almost to the point of madness. I lifted my earbuds in my jacket to my ears and turned on the troll pod in my pocket. It was time to show everyone here that I had a little power too. I hit play, and atomic bonsai (from the homestuck 'Strife!' album) began to play.

My power activated as well. You see, I had opted to get along with my Denizen, Appollo, and after a long series of conversations, he'd given me a gift. an ability he told me would be useful to me, if used correctly. My ability was to mentally broadcast anything I was listening to, to anyone I wanted. To put it simply, I was a moving radio tower, and everyone I wanted got reception. not only does this disorient my enemies and make me a hit at silent rave parties, it also makes it so I can completely block out Vriska from my mind and everyone else's, as well as attack hers.

I popped the four sets of glowsticks off my neck and connected them into two, ten-stick-long, glowing whips of death. glowstick throwing knives, whips, daggers, and needles. thats what you got when you packed strife glowsticks. I grinned madly as I raced forward to the beat drumming in my ears, running right under Eridan in his confusion of trying to find out where the hell the music was blasting from. He only noticed me when I was halfway up Vriska's hive wall, using my whips to scale it to the nearest window. He fired Ahab's crosshairs at me, but clearly the song was effecting his aim, because he missed by quite a bit each time. I grinned, waving at him as I slid into the window and dropped into a spiral staircase.

I found five of the bats in about twenty minutes. Vriska's hive seemed to be loaded with traps, but they were easy enough to avoid. spike pits, poison arrows, there was even a giant boulder at one staircase, which I smashed with a single whiplash. I wondered when Vriska was going to show up and fight me, but it seemed she didn't like facing someone who could fuck with _her_ mind head on. I was holding my eighth bat when I ran into Zen again, who dropped the ninth one into my hand. Patting his head, I grinned.

"Alright, one more to go and then I've got time to ransack some shit. think you can track the tenth bat, and where Vris is?" I asked, grinning wickedly. I knew Eridan wouldn't be a problem again unless I left the castle. It seemed he was in charge of the outer wall and Vris was running the hive. Zen nodded his head, as if telling me to follow him, which I complied with. We raced down a series of spiral staircases until we came to a large opening, I guessed about halfway down the canyon, Zen pointed his muzzle outside, and I crept forward to see what he was getting at.

"huh. . .I guess they did have a good challenge for me." I muttered. A giant spider glared back at me from her web outside. and when I say giant, I mean this thing was almost the size of the doomsday machine I had climbed across to get here. her web spanned most of the canyon, and I realized that it was littered with troll corpses, wrapped in silk. I shuddered slightly, realizing these were probably others who had lost against Vriska in FLARPing matches. The final bat sat comfortably in the center of the spider's web, directly below her poison dripping fangs. With a new sense of annoyance, I flipped the song I was listening to to 'Knife's edge', which was louder and more metalic. As I burst out into the light and onto the web, I glanced up to see Eridan above me, trying to deal with the new and more violent music, and trying to get a lock on me. Vris was a clever 8itch, I'd give her that. for almost anyone else, this was a sure fire death sentence. For me, this was a good waste of time with some exercise thrown in. Okay, so it was probably more like a near-death sentence I was playing off as nothing in my head.

I snapped one of my whips around two of the spider's back legs as I ran around it's side, pulling them out from under her as I went and causing her to fall towards me. this put a barricade between me and Eridan's weapon for half a second as I ran around the spider, careful to dodge it's flailing legs as It struggled to right itself with two of its legs still tangled. I barrel rolled across the center of the web, nimbly trying to avoid getting caught in the goo that dotted the web that probably kept things caught in it. I heard Eridan's weapon fire and felt searing heat blast a hole in the web about two inches from my left ankle, and I rolled forward to dodge the giant spider who was now able to stand again. I broke the whip that entangled her feet, breaking two sticks off of the chain and jumping up, stabbing both of them into one of the spider's knee joints.

With a large amount of screeching and thrashing, the arachnid collapsed sideways, blood gushing from its new and very painful wound. the thing clearly wasn't used to having to fight it's prey. Eridan must have gotten used to the rythym of my music, because his aim had certainly improved. If I hadn't stopped short before slipping back into the the castle, his last blast at me would have fried my face off. As it was, he missed, and I waved at him before slipping back into the castle walls.

I pulled out another ten glowsticks and formed a new whip as I met up with Zen. I had another 45 minutes to be out of here and back to Eq's place. it would take 10 minutes to escape and return, so I basically had 35 minutes to find Vriska and ransack her hive, as promised. Zen dropped a pouch into my hand, and I opened it to find a couple of large gems and quite a few gold coins. Well, that was a decent amount to ransack. but I wanted one more thing. . .actually, two.

I had decided to steal Vriska and Eridan's glasses. as a term of endearment towards Eridan, but with Vriska, I really just wanted to say 'fuck you' in a personal way. Zen led me up a series of spiral staircases, and eventually he just let me ride on his back up them, since we both knew I hated stairs. He climbed to one of the higher towers in the hive, dropping me off at a large wooden door. Without pausing, I busted the door open to find Vriska sneering at me.

"Not. . .8ad. you actually had some talent for this game." She managed snidly. It seemed she was still having trouble handling the loud, heavy metal music I had been blaring into her mind, but as I glanced at the floor I realized why she was sneering. Her strife weapon was a set of dice, and she had rolled straight fours. this seemed to mean I had to fight yet another giant, angry spider, which crawled out of nowhere and attacked me. I raised my weapon to fight, only to feel a blur of motion leap past me and watch as Zen tore the creature's head from it's body, then calmly dropped it at my feet. Vriska's sneer vanished as I looked up at her, grinning.

"you almost provided a good challenge, thanks." I said simply before kneeing Vriska in the gut. as she doubled over, I gently pulled the glasses from her face and held them up, waving at her as I turned toward the window. Eridan was floating about 15 feet away, Ahabs Crosshairs pointed at us. He fired, seeming to ignore the fact that his teammate was lying at my feet. I grinned, snapping one of my whips in front of me and breaking the blast in half. Before Eridan could react, I hit pause on my music and jumped out the window, wrapping a whip around his Lusus and hanging around it's neck. I leaned forward until I was inches from his face, my eyes hidden from his view under my hat as I grinned devilishly at him. We hung there, in silence for a few minutes, and I watched in complete amusement as his eyes widened in surprise behind his thick-framed glasses.

"you've got good aim Ampora. Let's play again sometime." I suggested, casually. I then leaned forward and bit down on the bridge of Eridan's glasses, lifting them off his face and falling back, off of his Lusus, and letting Zen catch me on his back, mid air. As we rode across the doomsday machine and towards Equius' hive, I grinned. Eridan's face had been a deep shade of purple as I had fallen away from him. I slid his glasses onto the edge of my nose as we rode towards the group of trolls, cheering and waving at us in front of Eq's Hive.


	7. Alternian parties of epic proportions

As it turned out, everybody there had seen the whole game play out. Equius and Vriska had arranged and set up his own robots throughout out her castle, probably to watch me get slaughtered. Instead, everyone had watched me and Zen Ransack Vriska's place, as promised.

"I told you she could kick Vriska's butt! I knew she would!" Nepeta cried, hopping up and down in excitement. Equius was sweating more now than he had been when he had spilled the milk earlier, and seemed to be avoiding eye contact- or, I guess, glance contact? since we both had something covering our eyes, it was hard to tell what either of us were looking at.

"H3h3h3, I c4n't b3l3ive you stole h3r gl4ss3s! Gog, you'r3 4 n4tur4l 4t this g4me!" Terezi cried, doubled over as I held vriska's glasses out to her. it seemed Kanaya was also trying to hold down her laughter, actually taking the glasses from me at one point and trying them on herself.

Grinning, I turned to find Tavros, who was looking at me with amazement and respect. "that was, uh, maybe pretty amazing. I didn't uh, think there was going to be someone who could, maybe stand up to Vriska. but you just, uh, kind of wiped the floor with her, huh?" He mumbled, sounding a little bolder than this morning. Did I spy the slightest hint of a grin on his toothy face? I nodded, reaching into my pocket and pulling out something I had found in the pouch Zen had ransacked for me.

"Hey, I think you'll like this more than I would." I said. It was a black spyglass, rimmed with gold. It looked like something you would find in a peter-pan story, or I guess here they had 'Pupa pan'. "It's a spyglass. I heard from Nepeta you liked Pupa pan, and I thought this looked like something he would have." I could see Tavros' fighting between embarrassment and excitement now, maybe unsure of what I thought of him liking a wriggler's story.

"Hey, maybe sometime you could tell me about Pupa Pan? I never really heard his full story before you know." I asked. Tavros just stared at me for a minute, and then a huge smile spread across his face.

"I think that's, uh, a definite possibility. Maybe you could come over, sometime, and uh, I could show you my book about pupa pan, and, uh. . . Have you heard of a game called fiduspawn?" He asked. Grinning, I was about to respond when someone started to pound on eq's front door.

"HeY MoThErFuCkErS, sOrRy We'Re LaTe!" called a very familiar voice. I looked over to See Equius stiffen, and then go to open the door. Gamzee came strolling in, with. . .Karkat behind him, glaring about angrily. the lump that's usually in people's throats came back, dropping comfortably into my stomach.

I turned to Tavros and muttered something about having to check up with Nepeta on something, then quickly made my way over to where Nepeta stood, trying to wave at Karkat. I grabbed her arm and spun her towards me, trying to remain calm.

"Hey. . .did you invite those two too then?" I asked, trying to seem relaxed. Nepeta eyed me a bit, nodding.

"Yeah. . .That's Gamzee and Karkat. Actually, Equius wanted to invite Gamzee, and I told him Karkat got to come too then, so we kind of both invited them to celebrate Vriska getting. . .I think Terezi called it 'pwned'." I actually did grin at that, then nodded.

"Do they. . . did they see the video yet?" I asked. Nepeta shook her head.

"No, we were going to run it again now that they're here. is that all right?" She asked. I paused, but nodded. Fuck it. Everyone might as well know everyone else's stories about me. I nodded, ruffling Nepeta's hat. Then, I turned and slipped out of the room and up the stairs, just catching the last words of Nepeta announcing the replay of the game was about to start.

* * *

I found my way on to the roof, deciding to sit up here in the safety of silence for a while. Eventually everyone would hear Karakat's story, and Karkat would know just how badly I could have kicked his ass. . .and how much of a freak I really was. I knew between him and gamzee the whole movie night thing would not be under wraps for long.

As I stared out across the rocky canyon, my eyes began to fix themselves on a particular shape, slowly making it's way towards Equius' house. as it got closer, I began to realize it was a troll. . .One who wore a cape.

Tilting my head, I pulled out my swords. I used the curved indents in the blades' edges to scale down the hive walls without being seen, creeping towards Eridan until he was about twenty feet away from the lights of the hive. He stopped there, just standing and staring at the hive's door. I remained by the hive wall, watching him, for a couple of minutes before deciding that talking couldn't hurt. Quietly, I crept about the shadows until I was only ten feet away before calmly speaking.

"Can I help you?" I asked. Eridan jumped, turning about in the darkness, trying to pin where I was.

"WWhere are you? I'm not armed, I just wwant my fuckin' glasses back!" He snapped, sounding more scared I was going to attack him than angry. I realized then that he probably couldn't see very well, and that the glasses probably hadn't been for show. I gently reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out the black, thick framed glasses.

"Calm down, it's me, Volpes." I said, taking a step forward. Eridan stiffened, turning his head in my general direction.

"I shoulda figured you'd be the one to find me wwhen I'm fuckin' out here wwithout any defense then. you probably already hate me like the rest of the fuckin' landwwellers." He snapped. I blinked, suddenly feeling my heart skip two beats. Oh Cod did he have that wrong.

"Why would I hate you? If anything, you impress me." I replied. I don't think Eridan was expecting that. He stopped, staring in my direction, squinting a bit as if he hadn't heard right.

"WWhat?"

"I mean, the only thing I can judge you by so far is the match we just had. And while your friend Vriska was great with insulting me and manipulating the whole game, I still wiped the floor with her face. You on the other hand, didn't say anything to me, but if I wasn't as fast as I am, it would have been you who would have culled me. Like I said, you've got good aim, even when I pretty much took out your sense of sound. That takes some skill." I let my words sink in for a minute. Eridan seemed surprised just by the fact I was complimenting him. I could almost see a faint blush peppering his cheeks, but that might have been my hopeful imagination.

"VVris. . isn't my friend. If anything, wwe're Kismesisis." He muttered. we lapsed into silence for a while longer. and then. . ."You're . . .not bad yourself you knoww. VVris has tried that trick wwith the spideron a lot of trolls, you're the first one to escape it's wweb." I grinned in the darkness. so he didn't instantly hate me. that was a start.

"Hey, I've got your glasses here. hold still, alright?" I said. before he could protest, I leaned forward and gingerly placed the glasses on his face, sliding them onto his nose and letting them rest comfortably on his face. He focussed on me for the first time, his face a foot or so away from mine.

"uh, thanks, I guess." He muttered, staring at me. he kept glancing at my hat, and I grinned, maybe a bit sheepishly.

"I like to wear my hat a little low. I see through gaps in the knitting, if that's what you're wondering." I explained, for maybe the fourth or fifth time in two weeks. Eridan nodded as if this made sense. He glanced away, back towards the other canyon, then sighed.

"I oughta be gettin' back to Vris' place, before she starts gettin' annoyed. she wanted me to get her glasses too, but I ain't her errand boy." Eridan grumbled, turning to walk back. But I already had a few gears in my mind turning, and I didn't feel like letting Vriska keep Eridan at her hive, miserable and angry. I tapped his shoulder as he turned, causing him to jerk a little.

"You don't have to you know. if you want, you could come inside and hang out with us." I offered. I was hit with a wall of silence. "I know where Vriska's glasses are, you could take them back tomorrow." I continued, "I think everyone else is spending the night since it's so dark out anyways. . . although I don't think eq agreed to that." I threw in, smiling a bit. Eridan didn't turn to look at me, he just stared forward.

"Cod, you don't get it, do ya?" he muttered, sighing. "Maybe they don't mind fef, but those guys Hate me. the only one who tolerates me if VVris, and only because wwe fight like heck. No one wwould wwant me to go in there." Eridan finished with a pang of sadness, maybe bitterness in his voice. I stood in silence with him for a few minutes, making up my mind.

I grabbed Eridan by the wrist and turned, tugging him towards Equius' hive. "Well, fuck what the rest of them want. I'm the hero of the evening, and I want you to come hang out. and if anyone's got a problem with it, I'll just leave with you, and we can both take Vriska back her stupid glasses." I decided, turning back. eridan was facing me, a look of surprise on his face. he looked shocked almost.

"seriously. . ? Ya wwant me to come hang out that badly? after I, ya knoww, almost blasted you to death multiple times today?" He managed quietly, as if unsure of how to react. I nodded, grinning.

"yeah, I do. Now am I going to have to drag you to the cod damn door, or are you going to come willingly?" I asked, giving his wrist another tug. Eridan shook his head, taking a nervous step forward, and then another one. after a few steps, he began to walk more confidently, until he kept pace with me right up to the door. I could feel him hesitate as I lifted my fist to bang on the door, we both could hear the shouts of laughter and arguing on the other side, but I turned and squeezed his wrist, then pounded on the door.

* * *

"Hey, someone open up! I got locked out and I don't want to keep my own guest waiting!" I shouted. after a minute, Nepeta flung open the door, grinning until she saw who was standing behind me.

"uh, Volpes, that's. . ." she trailed off as I grinned, shrugging.

"Yeah, it's Eridan. he came back for his glasses and we ended up talking. Since you and Equius invited everyone else to come watch me potentially get killed, I thought it would be alright for me to invite a friend too." I replied smoothly. after another minute of hesitation, Nepeta shrugged and let us in. The others seemed to have the same mindset Nepeta had. They would grin and wave at me until the saw who I was dragging around by the wrist. Then, they would turn back to whatever they were doing before. I was starting to feel Eridan's bitterness welling up when Gamzee spotted us, a big goofy grin on his face.

"Hey motherfuckers, what's up?" He called, walking over with a faygo in hand. "Sis, you're just made of miracles, aren't you? me and Karkat watched the game with everyone else, and it was like motherfuckin' miracle after miracle. Hey, do you have those whips still?" He asked hopefully. I heard Eridan sigh behind me, but I could tell he was relaxing. I grinned. thank you magical messiahs.

"Yeah, they're made of strife glowsticks. here. . ." I pulled out my remaining 30 sticks, 2/3 of which were already glowing. I showed Gamzee how to connect them, and pulled out the little sets of extra pipes, with triple connections and quad connectors to make 3D shapes, like orbs. the three of us ended up making the giant glowing ball, which we ended up throwing at terezi, who licked it and tossed it at Tavros, who rolled it to Nepeta. In the end, all of us threw the ball around the room, including even Equius (who had to roll it to avoid smashing anything) and Eridan, who finally seemed to be enjoying himself, offering me a weak, small, hint of a smile. As the game wore on, I slipped into the kitchen, where, at some point, a whole buffet line of food had been set up, probably be Arthor and Zen. I was reaching for a bag of chips when a voice froze me.

"Hey." I paused, turning to see Karkat glowering at me from a few feet away. I straightened up, trying but failing, to smile.

"Hey, I didn't know you were going to be here." I said.

"And I didn't know you were the crazy ninja Nepeta kept fucking ranting about, who was going to kick Vriska's ass." He replied shortly, glaring at me.

"Why didn't you go back to your hive that night?" He snapped. I stared, Tilting my head just a little.

"What. . do you-"

"you know damn well what I fucking mean!" He hissed. "Do you know how fucking upset Gamzee was when you didn't come back that night? He ended up forcing me to stay until dawn the next fucking morning, and you never came back. We fucking thought you were dead or some shit until you wrote him back a day fucking later." He let that hang in the air. I could hear everyone else in the other room laughing. I just stared for a while. but then, I shook my head. I was tired of being calm. why was it he was always the one to fucking yell?

"I'm sorry if I happened to run into Nepeta trying to kill my Lusus, and ended up hanging out with her that night. I'm sorry that I hoped that if I stayed away long enough, I wouldn't have to come back to you shouting at me again. I'm sorry that I don't really like being screamed at in my own house, let alone being called a freak because I don't wear my blood color on my clothes, you god damned hypocrite!" I snarled, glaring ferociously at Karkat. For once, he looked like he didn't know what to shout back. I paused, then looked away, picking up a cookie and rolling it in my hands.

"I didn't know what I'd done to piss you off again, alright? everything I did seemed to piss you off, and instead of upsetting you again, I decided I'd rather just let Gamzee calm you down and let you fucking forget about the freak who lived by the lake. I. . .I don't like being yelled at. Especially when I don't know how I can fix whatever pisses someone off so they stop yelling."  
Silence.

. . .

"You're not a freak, alright?" Karkat finally growled. I paused, holding the cookie between my hands. "I shouldn't have yelled at you like that. It's just. . . " Karkat trailed off, clearly getting upset that he couldn't explain. I stood there for a minute, and then, I smiled tiredly and walked over to him. He looked up at me, a bit of surprise in his expression as I placed the cookie in his hands and shrugged.

"I shouldn't have gotten that offended over it I guess. sorry for losing my shit about it." I said simply. Karkat just stared. This wasn't how this was supposed to go. He was supposed to have to rip his heart out and choke out a pathetic apology. I wasn't supposed to casually apologize for getting screamed at. And yet, that's how things went. It's never been in my nature to get upset, at least, not for long periods of time. And it was definitely in Karkat's nature to yell. Clearly, I was just going to have to adjust myself to not mind being yelled at. Actually. . . I had grown up learning that trick. I just had to start applying it to Karkat.  
Slowly, Karkat nodded, biting into the cookie he held while I grinned and turned, grabbing a bag of chips in one hand, and Karkat's wrist in the other, dragging Karkat back out to the party, where the others were still tossing the glow stick ball around.

I caught Gamzee's eye as we walked in, and he gave me a goofy grin. somehow, I think he knew exactly what had just happened. he was pretty intelligent for a stoner troll. Eridan sat by him, watching with the faintest of smiles as terezi and Nepeta batted the ball back and forth. Equius stood a little farther off, watching with a faint smile of his own. I think he was happy Nepeta was enjoying herself. I plopped Karkat between me and gamzee, and Eridan managed to maneuver himself next to me again. I grinned at him and he managed another weak smile.

* * *

I honestly don't think anyone went to sleep that night. We played a bunch of Alternian games, as well as some human ones I had remembered. Truth or dare, hide and hunt, glow stick tag, and grub in the middle, using the glowstick ball, were all pretty popular. Hide and hunt was like hide and seek, only, with weapons. Glowstick tag entailed everyone to go running around in the darkness of Equius' house, while one of us (Terezi the first time) ran around trying to catch the rest of us while wearing 20 glow sticks. When she caught someone, she would either put a gowstick necklace or bracelet on them, and then they would help her hunt for the rest of us as well. In the end, Eridan ended up winning. He had hidden with me, and when we were the last two to not be found, I gave myself up. Although he didn't really smile that much, I was happy that Eridan was at least comfortable here. I think he was having a good time, he wasn't complaining, which was more than we could say for Karkat.

I take back what I said before. I think a few of us did eventually pass out, myself included. I don't know when I actually fell asleep, but I awoke sometime in the earlier hours of dawn, crashed in side a pillow and blanket fort built around the couch. I vaguely remember setting this thing up with the others, dragging Equius over to help lift stuff. I think he was almost enjoying being told where to put stuff, although he seemed to be sweating a lot. I remembered arguing a little with him in the beginning though. . .

"Hey, Equius! come help us out!" I called, carrying a pile of blankets towards his couch. It was the first time Equius even bothered to glance over at what we were doing.

"Certainly not. all of you hoove already made quite a mess of my hive with your horseplay." He answered curtly. I glanced about the room and realized he was right. we had been running all over the place,knocking crap eveywhere. It was amazing Equius hadn't lost it by now, since I could tell by his use of equestrian terms that he was agitated. I looked around for Nepeta, and found that she was helping Karkat, Gamzee, and Tavros build their own fort. Karkat had been shouting about being able to build a much better fort than anything a wriggler like me could make, and I was determined to prove him wrong.

"Oh come on, we could use your engineering skills. You build robots all the time, right? building a decent blanket fort has got to be wriggler's play comparatively." I persisted, setting my load of blankets by the couch and turning to him. Even with his glasses on, I could tell Equius was glaring at me.

"Building machines and foolishly playing around with blankets are nothing alike." He growled. he took a step towards me. "And I don't take orders from the likes of you." I held my ground, calmly watching Equius' black cracked shades with a sense of icy dignity. I knew no one else was paying us any attention, even Eridan was too wrapped up in trying to build a fort.

With movement quick as lightning, I jabbed equius under his arms, making them go limp. I then pushed him into the kitchen and pinned him against the wall, holding his arms above his head with one hand, the other one tucked in my jacket pocket. I grinned at Equius' face, twisted in a mixture of shock, anger, and. . .maybe pleasure? He was definitely sweating at this point, quite a bit too.

"The likes of what? my blood color, the one you can't even see?" I purred, pressing my weight against Equius' wrists. He was a good inch or two taller than me, so I could only hold his wrists directly above his head, but I still managed it quite well. I didn't like being judged by people, and whether or not This guy could get my heart to skip, I wasn't about to be discriminated against. "Judge me by my character and what I can do, not by the color of the blood you can't even see, Zahhak." I . . .ordered, I suppose. I didn't say it unkindly though, I smiled, watching Equius' cracked shades slip a little down his nose. I could see his eyes. We stood in that silence for half a second more before I let Equius' arms fall to his sides. I hit two pressure points in Eq's shoulders, freeing up the mobility in his arms again.

"So. Come help us lift stuff and build a fort, would you?" I repeated, grinning. Equius shoved his glasses up the bridge of his nose, but nodded slightly. He looked around for a minute and picked a kitchen towel up from the counter, wiping his sweaty face and arms furiously as he followed me back into the living room. Terezi was tangled in a blanket, with Kanaya trying to help her out, and Eridan stood, trying to unfold another blanket.

on the other side of the room, I could see the others weren't doing much better. Karkat was chucking a wadded up sheet at Gamzee's head, Nepeta was batting a pillow into the air repeatedly, and Tavros was trying to untie the pillowcase wrapped around his horn. Sighing with a grin, I shook my head.

"Hey, I got us some extra help." I announced, grabbing the edge of the blanket Terezi was trapped in and pulling her free. She and the others looked at Equius hesitantly, at least until I chucked pillows at them. "C'mon, enough with the funny looks already. We've got a fort to build." I laughed.

And man did we build. Our fort ended up taking over the entire living room, using the couch as a centerpoint. As it turned out, Equius and I were a good team for building, setting up chairs and other furniture in rows, making decent columns that were easy to crawl through. Terezi and Kanaya decorated the fort by blanket color and pillow size, making the work me and Equius did look good. Eridan crawled inside the fort, loading it with junk food from the kitchen, books and glowsticks, and when we ran out of building material, I noticed him sneak over and steal some of Karkat's. with a devilish grin, I grabbed the material from him and we used it to make doors to the fort. By the end of our building, our fort had practically eaten Karkat and the others', and eventually we coaxed them into giving us they're stuff and joining our fort instead.

It was stupid, ridiculous, and fun. Trolls that were usually at each other's throats most of the time were sitting next to each other and sharing bags of popcorn and soda. I smiled contentedly, blinking slowly once or twice. before I realized it, I had dozed off, and I was waking up the next morning.  
Which, is where I am now.

* * *

_Hey. I know it's been a while since an update, but I hope all of you are still enjoying the story. By the way, I know I've made some altercations to this since I started it, so let me know if I've made any flaws in my story, or you feel like the characters aren't as cannon as they should be. I suppose you could say trolling is welcomed. Anyway, as always, thanks for reading_!


	8. heading home

_Hey Guys, Another chapter! As always, trolls and reviews alike are always appreciated, but not demanded. You might have noticed I flip around how I write for specific characters by now. Sometimes I'll use their actual writing quirk, and other times not so much. It honestly depends on how much time and interest I had in writing at the time I was working on these chapters. to be honest, they've been sitting around on my netbook for quite a few months now. AnYwAyS, that's that._

_Also, Another Announcment: This author cannot draw to save her life. This is only important because I was going to try and draw what volpes looked like, as well as her hive and other parts of this story, and I failed miserably. So because of my awful art skills, I'm afraid I have no epic visual aids. sorry about that._

_And on that note, enjoy the new chapter~_

* * *

I awoke slowly, blinking. my first impulse was to make sure my hat was still firmly atop my head, covering my eyes. It was, of course, having been held in place by my horns. I glanced around to find most of the others asleep in various positions, sprawled across the fort amongst junk food and glow sticks, books and. . . robot parts? I would have to ask about that later.

As I shifted, getting ready to sit up, I was met by a couple of surprises. I had been sleeping on my side, my back against the couch. My first surprise was that Eridan was laying on his side too. He had fallen asleep so that his back was also to the couch, our bodies facing the same way and our heads next to each other, his horns brushing against the top of my head. I had to look up slightly to see him, but I managed not to wake him. He was curled into a ball, fast asleep, but he looked content. I was smiling ever so slightly when I froze. Someone's hand brushed against my shoulder from above. I slowly lifted my eyes to a hole in the knitting directly above me. There I found my second surprise, that Equius was crashed out on the couch above me. It looked like his arms had been crossed when he'd fallen asleep. but one of them had slipped away, dangling over the couch and brushing against me. Sighing quietly, I tried to keep my heartbeat in check. Why did there have to be cute, kind of socially awkward trolls all around me? it made it so hard to stay quiet and calm.

It took about an hour before everyone else started to wake up. I crawled out of the fort and sat at the edge of the living room, resting my head against the wall as I waited patiently for the others. Karkat was the first up, waking up with a small string of cuss words before fumbling out of the fort himself. when he looked up, he spotted me, muttering something to himself before sitting next to me.

"How long have you been up?" He grumbled tiredly, stiffling a yawn.  
"Maybe an hour or so at the most." I said simply. He nodded, staring at the carpet as if trying to think of the right way to phrase something. His gaze went from a stare to an annoyed, and then angry glare after a while, and I finally interrupted his thoughts. "What's on your mind?"

His head jerked towards me, as if I had just flicked him. he rubbed his forehead and sighed. "No. . .nightmares?" He asked finally. Before I could answer he slammed his hand into his face, muffling an angry sigh. "Fuck, you probably don't want to answer that. Never fucking-"

"No actually." I cut in. Karkat paused, then removed his hand from his face to look at me. "I slept pretty well for the first time in. . well, I think it's been about a month since I last had a peaceful dream." I thought aloud, shrugging. Karkat nodded a bit, his usual frown seeming to lesson, maybe half a millimeter. We sat in silence for most of the rest of half an hour, until Terezi sleepily crawled out of the fort.

Everyone else came out slowly, within a couple of minutes of each other, until everyone was up and wandering around like zombies. Someone's stomach growled and before I knew it, Gamzee was going off about how I could make 'breakfast miracles' and that I needed to cook for everyone. After a few minutes of harassment from everyone else, I gave in, telling, not asking, Equius that I was going to use his kitchen for a while. With some help from Arthor, I found the largest skillet in the hive, capable of making three nests in one go, and I set to work. Two hours, one and a half loaves of bread, two dozen eggs, and twelve strips of bacon later, Everyone had been sufficently fed, and I was munching on my second nest.

I ended up showing Gamzee, Tavros, and Kanaya how to make eggs in a nest, although, in the end only Kanaya actually made a decent one. Tavros couldn't quite reach the counter, and Gamzee kept getting distracted and burning the food. Eventually, Terezi couldn't hold back a question any more.

"How d1d you l34rn how to m4k3 th3s3 4nyw4y?" she asked, just finishing off hers. I glanced over and noticed a couple of others looking at me too, Karkat and Equius included. I cracked a large grin. I had thought up a good answer for this one.

"My Lususes showed me." I said, causing Karkat to cut in.

"And how would a couple of oversized foxes know how to fucking cook?" He interjected.

"You would know, if you'd let me finish anything. Geez. . .My Lususes in particular have a very, very long lifespan. As it turns out, they only pick trolls with my symbol, in other words, only my ancestoral line."

I paused, reaching for a carton of milk sitting out on the counter. "They traveled a lot with my last ancestor, on who was around in the time of the suf-. . .uh, one who was around when there were quite a few rebellions." I corrected, pouring myself a glass. Last I had checked, it wasn't socially acceptable to mention the Sufferer, you could get culled for it in some places. As it was, the room was dead silent. If I hadn't been so confident in my dream that night, I might have started to worry about what I was saying. But, as it was, I was pretty sure I did have an ancestor in that time, or at least, something like one.

You see, although my dreams were usually nightmares, all of my dreams were prophetic. They either showed me the past, present, or future events, through my own eyes. my nightmares consisted of a lot of stuff from the past, and some things I knew would come to pass in the future, but I couldn't stop. but this dream. . . It had come from what I could only guess was Alternia's past, and my future.

I had awoken under a giant tree, with Zen and Nez by me. when I walked to the the edge of a nearby pond, I realized I wasn't a kid anymore. I had to have been at least ten, to 13 sweeps old, dressed in an all black outfit that was strikingly similar to my god-tier outfit from my session of sburb, but made of silk? I had decided to go for a run, finding I still had my troll pod with me and could still broadcast music. In the end, I had wandered through a large, capitalistic city, finding that adult trolls still ran the planet. My dream had ended as I wandered towards the center of the city, where I had found myself watching a large and terrifying troll, painting a wall with two of his, now dead, subordinate's blood. My last thought was of the troll's name, and all I could recall was someone saying 'the highblood'.

After waking, I realized that I had created an ancestor for myself, somewhere along the line. and that this gave me a great excuse to know everything I did, because hey, my Lususes explained it to me. "So. . .they've watched my ancestors figure things out and do stuff, and they learned specific tricks and tools of the trade to pass on to me." I summarized, letting it sink in to the room. after a while, Terezi nodded, grinning.

"Gr34t! Th4t m34ns V1sk4's not th3 only on3 who knows stuff about our 4nc3stors th3n!" She said, breaking the silence. I gave her a funny look, and she stopped to explain about Vriska having her ancestor, mindfang's journal, and how she had found some of the others ancestors mentioned in the journal. I nodded a bit, shrugging. I hoped I would be having more of those dreams soon, it seemed like I was going to need them.

* * *

Equius kicked all of us out after another hour or so. He started sending everyone out the door unless they were willing to follow his exact orders in cleaning up, which no one was really interested in doing. I helped take apart and fold up the fort though, piling things up so that they could be efficently put away. I ended up leaving with a box full of robot parts and some basic instructions on how to build some simple models, a present from Eq. well, kind of. He shoved it into my arms as I got ready to leave.

"So you can see for yourself that building the mechanics of an automaton if not even compareable to constructing a. . .blanket fort." He had growled. even through his cracked shades, I could tell see just the tiniest hint of amusement in his eyes, despite the sweat just rolling off of him. I grinned, telling him we would see about that, and walked out the door, finding that Zen wasn't the only one waiting outside for me.

Eridan and his Lusus were hanging around outside Equius' hive, although I could have sworn he'd left an hour ago. He looked uncomfortable, tugging at his scarf and frowning at nothing. I walked over towards him, but he didn't seem to notice me until I spoke.  
"Hey, what's up?" I asked, watching with a bit of amusement as the seadwelling troll jumped, staring at me for a second before regaining his composure. he was still frowning, as if he didn't like something.

"I need VVris' glasses back." He muttered, kicking the dirt around his feet. "She's got Ahab's Crosshairs, and she told me there wwas no wway I'd be gettin' it back unless I went and got her Cod damn glasses, like a stupid errand boy."

I reached into my jacket and felt for the glasses I knew were there, pulling them out and offering them over. As Eridan reached out for them, a pulled them back a couple of inches, causing him to stop, and then glare at me. "WWhat the fuck do ya wwant from me?" He growled. I smiled, shaking my head.

"To calm down, first of all. I'll let you take these back to Vris, but only if you let me come with you. I wanted to see if she would be up to FLARP with me again, and maybe you too? It was fun." I explained, offering out the glasses again. Eridan's glare softened, and he grabbed the glasses, glancing away.

"Yeah, sure. WWhatevvver, it's not like I can force ya not to followw me or somethin'." He mumbled. I swore I could see a tint of purple in his cheeks right then, but before I could decide, he turned away from me, getting onto his seahorse lusus and riding towards Vriska's hive. I smiled quietly and looked over at Zen, who gave me a silently knowing look before letting me onto his back and taking off after Eridan.

* * *

Vriska wasn't happy to see me following Eridan to her hivestep. At least, not until I explained to her why I was there. I stopped a couple of yards from the door, glancing up. It was a good thing Zen had been paying attention at least, because Vriska had gotten us in her sights with Ahab's Crosshairs. Zen dodged as she fired two blasts at us, and It was all I could do to hang on as he pulled some particularly fast and gymnastical (Is that even a word?) moves. I could hear Eridan shouting something above me, but I didn't catch what. I just knew he sounded alarmed.

I felt Zen hit the stone of Vriska's castle and realized he was scaling the wall, heading directly towards the window Vriska was positioned at. I felt something singe my knee, but that was it before a rush of air. the next thing I knew, vriska was pinned underneath my Lusus' front paws, ahab's crosshairs scittering across the room. I grinned.

"you know, I could kill you right now." I said simply, sliding off of Zen's back and walking over to retrieve Eridan's weapon. When I turned again, I found Eridan at the window, trying to dismount from his Lusus and crawl through the gap.

"Cod VVris, wwhat's your problem?" He shouted as he turned, pausing when he took in the situation. He looked up in surprise to see me handing him his weapon, which he quickly captchalogged.

"Get your stupid mutt off of me!" Vriska snarled, vainly trying to squirm out from under Zen.

"First of all, he's a fox, not a dog. and Second, you're certainly not one to be making orders after trying to kill me for the second time this week." I replied casually. even as I said it, I nodded at Zen, who simply stood and walked out of the room. Vriska scrambled to stand up, glaring at me with absolute malice. I smiled in return, turning to Eridan.

"I think it might be a good idea to give her back her glasses before she tries to assassinate me again." I suggested. Eridan nodded, snapping back to the present and uncaptchalogging Vris' glasses, handing them over. She snatched them back, shoving them onto her face and glaring at me again.

"Geez, you look like I killed your puppy or something. Look, all I wanted to do was come here and thank you for hosting the FLARP yesterday, and ask if you wanted to set another round up some other time." I explained, leaning against the wall. Vriska's glare softened a bit when I mentioned Flarping, and she seemed to be considering her options.

"Me set it up? As in, I make the rules a8ain?" She asked, a small, snarky smirk starting on her face. I grinned in return, nodding.

"Sure. rules, goals, location. You run the set up. I'm too lazy to plan things out anyway." I replied simply, shrugging.

"Well then. . .I would loooooooove to play a8ain with you. I think it's a faaaaaaaantastic Idea." Between the two of us, the bloodlusting tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife. Clearly Eridan picked up on it too, he tugged at his scarf and cleared his throat a bit, catching both of us off guard and turning our attention towards him.

"WWell, I'vve got to head home noww that I'vve got my stuff. . . I was expecting to have another Lusus to feed to Fef's, but since that plan didn't work out, I gotta go kill somethin'." He muttered, seeming to avoid my gaze for most of it. I shrugged, leaning off the wall.

"Alright then, I'll go with you, since I should be heading home too. Vris, send me a message on Trollian when you want to FLARP again. I'm sure Nepeta will be more than happy to give you my handle. Talk to you later.~" I purred, trying not to smirk as I recieved another one of her death glares.

Me and Eridan were about a mile away from the ocean, riding next to each other when Eridan shouted something.

"Oh Cod, your bleeding!" He shouted. Zen stopped immediately, knocking me off his back and whirling around to see where Eridan was staring. I looked down to find a part in my jeans that had been burnt through by Ahab's crosshairs, and a nasty burn was left smoldering on my skin. I hadn't even noticed the thing. I breathed a sigh of relief though, realizing that Eridan was wrong and that I was definetely not bleeding, and thus that he couldn't see my blood color. I'd done such a good job of keeping it under wraps so far, it felt it'd be a shame for it to be discovered now. Well, aside from Karkles knowing I was a seadweller anyway.

"Oh, it's just a burn. It's alright." I said, trying to remember where I'd captchalogged my first aid kit.

"just a burn? Volp, it's fuckin' half a foot long and black!" Eridan cried, a bit of panic in his voice. He looked like he wanted to hit something now, and I was more worried for him than myself.

"Hey, hey. it's alright. Calm down, okay?Seriously, All this will do is give me a half inch long battle scar when it finishes healing. It's nothing for you to worry about. february 10th." I threw in the date I had the kit captcha'd under, and the first aid kit tumbled out and into my hands. I cracked it open, pulling out a green balm first, which was made of specific herbs for burns. I treated the foot long singe mark with the green paste, and then pulled out a roll of white cloth, wrapping it around my calf a couple of times before cutting it, and then using a couple of metal fasteners to hold the cloth in place. I became aware of Eridan watching me through the whole process, with a bit of concern maybe?

"there, see? No problem." I said, smiling up at him. "give me a hand up, would you?" I asked. he complied, helping me up and onto Zen again. We continued towards the ocean, catching a giant sloth Lusus for Feferi's Lusus to eat along the way. I waved goodbye to Eridan as he floated over the ocean, and then rode Zen back to our hive. It was almost dark by the time we got home, and Zen was tired from all the running he had been doing the past couple days. Luckily, Nez had set out food for us, and I was able to relax in my hive. I crawled into my recoupracoon that night,yawning contentedly as I drifted into sleep.

My dreams picked up from a different time in the same story as the night before. Now, I was in a throne room covered in blood, perched on the arm of a giant throne. I found that the highblood was sitting in the throne itself, his head tilted back as he talked in a deep, gutteral voice, about a vast honk that would come someday, and the beauty of death. It was relaxing to listen to in a way. after a while, we ended up painting in blood, and I found that he knew about my ability, for he asked me to play something appealing while we painted in a couple of rust-blood colors. I selected a dark carnival song, which the highblood seemed to enjoy immensely, and we ended up painting a mural of carnage, the highblood making a cut on his arm so that he could paint himself in his own blood. Although the entire scene was terribly morbid, I found myself at ease, and I almost regretted it when I awoke the next morning.


	9. Adventures, intros, and awkward moments

_Oh my goodness. So many apologies need to be given for the little mix up with my updates the other day. I was kind of half asleep when I updated, and clearly not paying all too much attention. Think of this update as an apology for that one. (If I manage not to mess this one up all too much that is~)_

_as always, enjoy~_

* * *

Before long the month ended, and I found myself looking at only three more months before the troll's session started. I had met almost everyone now,even Aradia. Or at least, Aradia's ghost. She seemed surprised I could see her, it seemed most people couldn't, now that she was dead.

I had found her floating around the lake outside my hive one morning, a few days after returning home from Equius' hive, after the victory party. It was early in the morning and I was sitting outside on my deck, nibbling a piece of bagel with a bit of slime spread across it. No, not sophor slime. It seemed there were many edible kinds of slime on Alternia, their effects ranging from drug like qualities, to just tasting good. As I nibbled my breakfast though, I began to watch something drifting across the lake behind my house. It was foggy out, and the sun had yet to rise up over the trees, so I couldn't quite figure out what I was watching at first, but I soon began to recognize the shape. It was a troll.

I watched in silence as the figure seemed to float over the lake's surface, never once disturbing the water. They were more towards my side of the lake than the other by now, so I was able to make out small features in the fog. They had curved horns, like a ram, they wore a skirt, so they had to be a girl, and she had long, fluffy hair. fluffy, poofy. . .something along those lines.  
I watched, my curiosity piqued. my fingers reached towards my spirally bangs, and I began to twirl them out of habit, as I usually did when I was interested in something. My fingers twirled and tightened the ringlets, only to let them unfurl again when they could twist no tighter. after a few minutes of this I made up my mind, deciding to investigate this strange troll.

I quietly slid into my house and grabbed my twin blades, opting to leave my strife glow sticks behind today. they would give me away in the fog if I used them. I opened my front door and made my way around the back of my house, walking down a well worn path to the lake below. I kept the troll girl in my sights, watching as she drifted to the edge of the lake, about twenty feet from me. I now had a good view of her, despite the fog. she had a black T-shirt on, and a gray skirt, which appeared to be a little tattered or even burned on the bottom. I couldn't see her symbol from here, I could only make out a smudge of red through the fog. I began to wonder if she was alright, if something had happened to her and that's why her skirt was burned and she was wandering around in the woods. Cautiously, I slid into view, my left hand on one of my blade hilts, tensed to fight if the need arose.

"uh. . .hey. are you all right?" I called out. The troll spun around, and I now recognized who it was from a picture I had been shown a few days before. Standing before me was Aradia Megido, a ghost. She seemed almost surprised that I was talking to her. Almost. for some reason, it looked like she had no emotion whatsoever instead.

"You can. . .see me?" She asked in a flat, almost robotic manner. I nodded, my hand moving away from my weapons.

"Yeah. . . should I not be able to?" I asked, answering her question with another.

"Most trolls aren't able to see me, no." She replied. I realized something else as she fixed me with a steady, appraising gaze. Aradia's eyes were solid white. We stood there, in the fog for a couple of minutes. I wasn't sure what to say next, and it didn't seem that Aradia was interested in speaking again.

"You must be dead, with those eyes. Usually I only see the dead when I sleep, but. . you must be an exception. . . you had powers when you were alive, huh?" I asked. it was hard to seem friendly with the dead, they were always toneless, I always had trouble telling what they were thinking at first. I was telling the truth though. once in a while, I would see ghosts in my dreams. they would guide me through whatever I was viewing, showing me what needed to be seen in my visions. I had learned that trolls with psychic powers in life retained them in death, and this, for some reason, allowed me to see them while I was awake, as well as asleep.

Aradia dragged my thoughts back to the present by confirming my guess. "Yes. I could see and talk to the dead, as well as move things." She stated. I nodded again, offering a smile.

"Well, I never mind visits from the dead. If you need anything, I in the hive over there." I gestured towards my house, as I spoke. " stay as long as you like. Oh, my name if Volpes, by the way." I continued offering a slight bow. I had always found it paid to respect the dead.

"Volpes. . . you are the one the others keep talking about then." Aradia stated tonelessly. my spine tingled a bit. Did she mean others as in the dead, or others as in the other trolls? and. . .what were they talking about?  
"Oh? I didn't know I was the topic of conversations lately." I said, tilting my head sideways. I could almost see a tiny smile flicker across Aradia's face.

"Nothing insulting, don't worry. Nepeta and a few others told me about your victory against Vriska a few days ago. It seems you have become a bit of a hero to Tavros as well. It seems the only troll with a negative opinion of you is Vriska herself." Aradia explained. I tilted my head to the other side, smiling a bit. It was nice to know I had been well received at least. Again, Aradia's words brought me back to the present.

"Your eyes. . .your hide them under that hat because they glow, don't you?" She asked. I jerked upright and stared at her. and then I realized how she knew. the lights that danced from my pupils had shown through my hat and began glowing inside the mist, turning the fog around me gentle shades of gold and purple.

"Crap!. . ." I hissed under my breath, shutting my eyes tightly. I was trying to come up with some explaination for my eyes when Aradia spoke.  
"They look nice you know. you should be proud of them." She told me, tonelessly. I opened my eyes again slowly, my fingers reaching for my bangs. I twirled the ringlets quickly, nervously, but nodded a bit.

"They don't always glow. most days, they look normal. It's just. . . They light up for specific reasons, and there's a lot of those. I think if people look at my eyes too long, they'll fall asleep, so I hide them for that reason too. . ." I petered off, tugging at my hat. I pulled it off my head, and let it fall to my side, in my hand. I felt the damp morning air against my fins and hair. she noted the fins with the same calmness she had noted my eyes with. It seemed nothing would surprise her.

"I don't believe I have told you my name yet." Aradia stated breaking the silence. "I'm. . .I was, Aradia Megido. You do not seem to have full control of your own power. That is why you can't control when your eyes light up. If you would like, I could help you try to control it." She offered. Her voice remained blank, but I could sense her kindness through her offer. I looked up at her, and found her floating a few feet from me, a hand extended. I felt a flicker of hope in my stomach, and it melted all nervousness from me. I grinned, shaking Aradia's extended hand and nodding.

"Any help I could get would be much appreciated, trust me."

Aradia ended up becoming a partial roommate after that. She would haunt around my house for a few days, follow me in my dreams, and help me curb my glowing eyes, as promised. but then, without explanation, she'd disappear for a week, only to show up and continue to haunt my house. it wasn't until the last week of that month that I discovered where she would drift off to. At least, one of the places. She was keeping an eye on her old friend. Sollux Captor.

-

Sollux tolerated me because I could understand bits and pieces of his hacking, and also because, as it turned out, my music broadcasting could block out th

e voices of the dead that constantly assaulted him. As long as I was around, he was able to relax.  
We ended up meeting when I showed up at Karkat's house one day. . .uninvited. I was bored, and it seemed Nepeta and Equius were busy that day. Since Karkat's hive was the next closest, I tried to contact him on trollian to see if I could come over. he wasn't on, and after a few minutes of waiting I decided to just show up. He would be pissed, but then again, he was always pissed. Besides, he couldn't stay mad at me for long. . .I had a stack of romcoms on my side.

I took the same route I had gone walking the first time I had met Karkat, a dirt path past the lake and into the troll version of the city. little hive clusters dispersed across a dark landscape, two or three stores packed together efficiently and run by trolls who were a few sweeps away from leaving the planet. This was kind of how trolls prepared for life outside of Alternia I guess. When a troll became old enough to leave Alternia, he or she would board one of the empire's giant battle ships that docked on Alternia annually, and be shipped out of here. They would then apply for whatever subsector or job they had wanted, such as to be a member of the subjugulators. if they weren't deemed worthy of their goal jobs, they'd be placed wherever the higher-ups deemed them useful.  
Not everyone can be a planet conquering warlord though. Some trolls would end up working as guards to conquered planets, shopkeepers, merchants, or messengers. there were many lesser-known jobs that young trolls would only discover after being kicked off the planet. Unfortunately, a lot of them would discover those jobs the same day their dreams were crushed and it was decided they'd do best cleaning up after other troll's lusii. As for myself, If I hadn't known the world was going to be destroyed in a few months, and I had actually been born on this planet, I might have liked to work as a traveling merchant when I got older. going from planet to planet, selling various wares, conning people and helping them once in a while. . .It seemed like a job that would never get boring.  
Anyways, the few shops that existed on Alternia were run by trolls who had already decided to aim for an average life, and had opted for a head start in the sales business. when they left Alternia, another troll would probably take over the shop, and life would continue on with the changes unnoticed.  
As I came around the final turn in my walk, I began to see Karkat's hive a few blocks down. I grinned, remembering where I'd captchalogged the romcoms. The troll who I bought them from was new at running the movie shop, and I had conned him into selling me these rental-only movies for barely half of what they were worth. From my point of view, I was just preparing the guy for real life. He'd thank me later.  
I walked up the walkway to Karkat's hive, testing the door and finding it unlocked, as usual. I opened it without knocking and strolled inside like I owned the place.  
"Hey, Karkat! You weren't answering when I trolled you so I decided to come see if you had been kidnapped or something!" I shouted sarcastically down the main hallway. Karkat's hive was a carbon copy of all the other hives on this block. a flight of stairs to the right of the door way, three rooms and a hallway upstairs, a hall leading from the front door to the kitchen/living room and the bathroom on the first floor. As I glanced around, I could hear Karkat's Lusus, 'Crabdad' screeching in the kitchen, along with it's claws clacking together. Since I didn't really feel up to dealing with the beast today, I began inching towards the stairs.

"GOG DAMNIT." Was the first response I got. Karkat's voice snarled from upstairs.  
"QUIT FUCKING USING SUCH CHEAP ASS MOVES, YOU NOOKSUCKING. . .ARGHH!" my eyebrows knitted together as I headed up the stairs. clearly Karkat wasn't talking to me, but then. . who?  
I walked down the hallway on his top floor, pausing at his bedroom door and listening again. I could hear Karkat's growls and swear words under his breath, a bunch of clicking and sound effects, along with a lot of background fighting music, and. . . an unfamiliar voice laughing.  
"geez KK, iit2 not my fault you 2uck at viirtually every game you play. II even gave you ten 2econds to try and kiill me fiir2t thii2 round." Whoever it was, it was clearly a guy, and he had a bit of a lisp when it came to pronouncing his 's' sounds. It actually sounded kind of adorable really. My curiosity piqued, I silently opened the door.

I was greeted by the sight of Karkat and another troll sitting on the floor, staring at the image screen mounted to the wall. (Troll version of TV, put simply.) a video game, which seemed to be an all out brawl style fighting game, blared music and shouting, punching, and dodging sound effects. Karkat sat hunched over his controller, his face contorted into a look of pure rage, while the other troll was leaning back, relaxed, and with a sly grin on his face.  
The other troll wore a pair of bi-colored glasses, one lense red, the other blue. he had two sets of pointed horns growing out of a pointed hairstyle which seemed to be natural. he seemed a bit taller and lankier than Karkat, like a classic nerd style look. I grinned, recognizing him from my observations of the troll's session. This must have been Sollux Captor.  
The two trolls were so wrapped up in their game they hadn't noticed me yet. I opted to put that to my advantage and slipped into the room silently, inching my way against the wall until I was behind them, sitting on the edge of Karkat's recupracoon. The game was almost finished at that point. the character that was clearly Karkat's had almost no health left, and with a death blow combo move from Sollux's character, Karkat's player went down with his head exploding.  
"FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF FFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUCK YOU CAPTOR. I LET YOU HAVE THE BETTER CHARACTER AND YOU FUCKING KNOW IT. THOSE WERE CHEAP MOVES AND YOU FUCKING KNO-"  
" ii2 that why in2i2ted on u2 2witching character2 thi2 round? becau2e I 2till kicked your a22 when you u2ed thi2 guy la2t time." Sollux cut in, smirking when Karkat's face contorted into a new level of rage. He even started laughing when Karkat tackled him, in a clear attempt to beat the shit out of Sollux's offending mouth. At this point I couldn't help it anymore. I busted out laughing at the whole scene, causing both trolls to freeze in mid-struggle and stare at me. I grinned over at them, offering a little wave.  
"Hey Karkat. Don't mind me, go ahead and keep trying to murder your friend there." I said casually, smirking. Karkat's face seemed to darken a bit with redness as he thrashed his way off of Sollux and to the other end of the room before fixing me with one of his famous 'I-hate-you-so-fucking-much-words-cannot-contain-the-gravity-of-this-much-platonic-hatred' death glares. Sollux on the other hand, simply sat up and stared at me, looking a little annoyed. Like I was some piece of data that shouldn't be in this code or something.  
"Do you know her Karkat?" He asked, looking over at Kar, who didn't even pause from his death glare.  
"UNFORTUNATELY, YES. AND IT SEEMS SHE STILL REMEMBERS HOW TO ANNOY THE FUCK OUT OF ME BY SHOWING UP IN MY LIFE WITHOUT BEING FUCKING INVITED." He growled, his eyes pissed off little slits of rage. I shrugged, as if to say 'sorry, but whatcha gonna do?' in a small gesture.  
Karkat sighed angrily, rubbing his forehead. "THIS IS VOLPES, THE TROLL WHO MAKES FRIENDS WITH EVERYONE, ANNOYINGLY ENOUGH, AND THEN WON'T LEAVE THEM THE HELL ALONE BUT SOMEHOW AVOIDS GETTING CULLED ANYWAYS. SHE'S ALSO THE ONE WHO KICKED VRISKA'S ASS A COUPLE OF WEEKS AGO." He explained. Sollux raised his eyebrows, eyeing me in a different light now. I smiled back at him, not sure what else to do.

"AND AS FOR YOU. . ." he said, still glaring at me, "THIS PIECE OF SHIT IS SOLLUX CAPTOR, ALTERNIA'S MOST DECENT HACKER AND ALSO A BI-POLAR ASSHOLE WHO FUCKING _CHEATS AT VIDEOGAMES._" He shouted the last words, emphasizing them even more so than everything else he said. Sollux flipped him the bird in response, seeming to be more irritable now than he had been a few minutes ago. maybe he was slipping into a mood swing?

"Welp, nice to meet you Captor. If Karkat would answer his trollian account once in a while, I wouldn't have had to show up uninvited and you could have continued kicking his ass a video games." I said, sliding off of the recoupracoon. I saw the faintest smile flicker across Sollux's face, and heard Karkat start up an argument on the other side of the room.

"NOW HOLD ON JUST A FUCKING MINU-" Of course, I cut him off.

"Oh calm down Kar, I'm only half joking. besides, a brought presents. March 12th." I ordered, uncaptchalogging a bag of romcoms and tossing them to Karkat. He browsed through my movie choices, still glaring, but clearly a little less pissed off now that he had new romance movies to watch.

"2o, do you do thii2 often?" Sollux asked, looking at me from behind those bicolored specs of his. I could feel my own eyes changing colors, flickering between gold and purple under my hat.

"Nah, Only when I bored. Nepeta and Equius were busy today, and I couldn't get ahold of Eridan so. . ."  
"Eriidan? you mean that 2tuck up a22hole hiip2ter douche?" Sollux asked, glaring at the very thought.

"Uh. . . I guess so? I met him last week when I kicked his and vriska's ass at the flarp thing. He's not that bad a guy when he quits acting like the world hates him." I countered, feeling the need to defend my new friend.

"That2 becau2e mo2t of the world doe2 hate hiim. he'2 2uch an a22 all the tiime to anyone who doe2n't have giill2 no one but Feferii can tolerate hiim, and don't get me 2tarted on hii2 whole genociide ob2e22iion-"

"I won't. you can totally let it go at any time, since I actually can tolerate him and I still don't think he's as bad as your making him out to be." I cut in, a little sharper than I intended to. Sollux stared at me. He seemed surprised I was still defending Eridan, more shocked than upset really. Instead of countering or getting pissed off though, he just shrugged and suddenly became interested in the ground. I glanced at Karkat, who had a look of confusion on his face too. He shrugged, pulling out a couple of movies from the bag and throwing one at Sollux.

"COME ON DUMBASS. WE'RE GOING TO WATCH THESE SINCE THEY'RE HERE." He ordered, heading out of the room. Sollux gave me another puzzled look before following after Karkat and out of the room. Sighing a little inwardly, I followed after the other two and down towards Karkat's living room.  
We were about halfway through the closest thing trolls had to 'breakfast at Tifanny's' (I think) when I became bored. and when I get bored, I tend to wander. So I got up when Karkat wasn't looking and started exploring his house some more. I turned on my trollpod while wandering upstairs, flipping to a song I couldn't remember the name of, with a fast-paced techno beat. I decided to explore one of the two rooms on the top floor I hadn't been in before, the one at the top of the stairs that was always locked.

Ha. Like I couldn't pick a lock while blindfolded. I pulled a bobby pin out of my pocket and picked the lock with ease, strolling into a dark room.

I fumbled around and found the light switches, flipping one on and taking a moment to figure out what the hell I was seeing. It Was. . .a library? Kind of. there was a couple of bookshelves, yeah. a couple were filled with DVDs though. and then, on the other side of the room was a home-made troll dummy, with a bunch of slash marks that looked suspiciously sickle shaped. Maybe this was Karkat's training room too? I wandered over to the books. Ha. what a surprise. It seemed that Karkles read those cheesy Romance novels you usually grab at an airport as something to distract you on a long flight. the shelf was full of them, which led me to wonder where in th universe some adult troll was writing this crap, and how anyone but Karkat and a few others could buy this stuff.

I was wondering that when I heard shuffling at the door. I looked up and Froze. Sollux Captor was looking down at me from the doorway with an air of shock and awe. but. . . why?

"Oh, hey. . . Sorry, I got bored with the movie and decided to see what was in here. . ." I started. But It didn't seem like Sollux was paying much attention.

"II can't hear them. . .they're gone." He muttered, his eyebrows knitted in confusion. "All II hear ii2 that mu2iic, and iit'2 not half bad. . ."

"Um. . . what?" I asked. Even I was having trouble following this one. who couldn't he hear? Sollux looked at me with the same puzzled expression, but relented to explain.

"II. . II u2ually hear the voiices of the dead iin my head. they're con2tantly there, but 2ometiimes louder than other tiime2. when there's a lot of them, II get miigrane2. They were 2tartiing to overpower my braiin whiile II wa2 watchiing the moviie, 2o II fiigured II would go 2it in KK'2 room untiil they gave up and left me alone. But. . .When II 2tarted heading up the 2tair2, II heard 2ome mu2ic playing. the louder the 2ound got, the quieter the voiice2 diid. Now that II'm up here, II can't hear them at all, ju2t. . .the mu2ic. and iit'2 actually pretty good." He explained, smiling now. He started swaying, and for half a second I thought he was going to break out into dance. I realized he was listening to the same beat I was. He was 'tuned in' to my music.

I grinned. "Um. . . that would probably be me." I broke into his thoughts, standing up and tugging at my headphones. "It's uh, my ability. I broadcast sounds. You 'tuned in' t what I'm playing, and. . I guess it blocks ghost frequency?" I finished. I sounded a little more shy than I wanted to, and what for? Sollux was clearly happy with this whole thing. He was looking at me in a new light (again) and grinning.

"well, iit'2 awe2ome, whatever you're doiing keep doiing iit. II haven't been able to thiink my own thought2 liike thii2 iin forever."

We headed back downstairs to inform Karkat of the awesomeness that was me. Unfortunately, his best response was to chuck pillows at us for interrupting the major point of his movie. we retaliated by attacking him from both sides with said pillows. In the end, a pillow war was had, and I had another friend.

* * *

_Hey. Quick note on this last part. I had intended on introducing my patron troll differently, but a friend gave me this idea while I was writing and then it was stuck in my head and __would not leave.__ So although I'm not all to interested in homestuck's tradition in March, I felt like this needed to be a thing. Yeah.~_

* * *

I met Feferi on the most awkward of circumstances. Vriska had pulled a nasty trick on Eridan in revenge for one stupid thing or another, and this trick involved embarrassing the fuck out of him in front of me, Fef, and Sollux, just for good measure.

Let's back track to the beginning of the day though. It started out as normal as it can get for me, with me crawling out of the recoupracoon and taking a shower, getting dressed and raiding the fridge for noms. It only started down the path of weirdness when I got onto my huskbook and got a message from Vriska.

Arachnid'sGrip began trolling DazedDreamer at ?:?

AG: Voooooooolpes! you won't 8eleive what I caught for you! It's a real surprise! ::::::::D

I shook my head. this couldn't be good.

AG: 8ut you'll have to share, since it's for you, Feferi, and Sollux too! I've invited them over as well, you should all show up in about an hour or so to my Hive, alriiiiiiiight?  
DD: ~hmmm. . .Last time I showed up at you hive for a 'surprise' you blacked out you entire hive and tried to cull me in the dark.~  
DD: ~But my interest is piqued. I'll be there. See you then Vris.~  
DazedDreamer ceased Trolling Arachnid'sGrip at ?:?

I didn't like the sound of this. Vriska's 'surprises' tended to be nasty tricks indeed. and what did me, fef, and sol all have in common that would be something Vriska could use?. . . Oh no.  
There was in fact, one thing she could definitely use. One troll, actually.  
What had she done with Eridan? Fuck.

I quickly scanned for him online, but of course, he wasn't there. Fuck. she'd done something with him and now she was inviting the rest of us to come see it. What had she done was the question. had she culled him? No, that wasn't her style. had she beaten the crap out of him and was now holding him hostage? possibly. maybe this wasn't about us. Maybe Vriska's plan was to embarrass Eridan beyond belief, and she knew the best way to do that is to have us come see him in the lowest light possible.  
I sighed, rubbing my forehead. It was definitely going to be a long day. I grabbed my dual blades and a set of strife glow sticks, heading out the door. Nez trotted up next to me, and I grinned. Having the more evil of my two Lusii with me today might be for the best. I hopped onto his back and told him to head for Vris' place, and he nodded, bolting off and leaping over the trees of the forest behind my hive.  
It only took me half an hour to arrive, which gave me another half hour to undo whatever Vriska had done to Eridan. I took the direct approach, riding right up to her front door and knocking on it. It took a couple minutes, but Vriska flung open the door with a flourish, grinning cruelly at me.

"My My, you showed up half an hour early! You must 8e just soooooooo excited!" She oozed, the sarcasm dripping off her voice. I smirked, shrugging.

"What can I say? You have me interested. Now then. . .let's cut the crap. where's Eridan and what have you done to him?" I stated. Vriska's eyebrows shot up, but she kept the same evil smirk.

"You put two and two together fast, I'll give you that much. Well, since your so eager, I'll let you have a sneak peak. It's not like you can do much to help him out at this point anyways." Uh oh. I didn't like the sound of that. Vriska led me up the stairs to one of the highest towers in her hive, pulling out a skeleton key, who's handle was- surprise, surprise,- a figure eight. With a nasty grin she opened the door and let me walk in, slamming it behind me. I heard a click and noted that she'd just locked me in the tower. But I wasn't focussed on that at the moment. I was focussed on the troll in the corner of the room, with their knees pulled up to their chest.

It was Eridan, but it wasn't. He. .she. . it, was wearing a plaid miniskirt, red with black, a black short tube-top with a couple of purple streaks that had to have been his symbol. He was wearing black and purple striped stocking-socks that went up to his knees, a couple gold bracelets, and even black hair extensions pulled into ponytails on either side of his head. I couldn't believe it. My mind could barely register what I was seeing. No wonder Vriska seemed so excited. From the couple of times we had talked about her, I knew how much Eridan cared about Feferi. if she ever saw him like this. . .it would crush his world. In a very, very awkward way.

"E. . Eridan?" I managed, taking a step forward. Eridan froze. slowly, he looked up. to my horror, he had makeup on to match his outfit. Or he used to. a lot of it had been smeared away by tears. he looked at me in horror, trying to shake his head a little bit.

"Oh cod. . .Don't look a me!" He shouted, his face going deep purple as he backed further into his corner.

"Eridan, it's alright! Calm down. . .What happened? why are you. . .?" I asked, trying to calm the seadweller down. I walked over to where he was, crouching in front of him with a look of concern. I placed a hand on his shoulder, which he flinched at, like he was afraid I wanted to beat the crap out of him or something. Finally though, he managed to explain.

"It's all my fault. I. . I don't knoww wwhat I wwas thinkin'. . .I just. . .I wanted to try on a skirt, and then I ended up buying the top and. . .Cod, no one was supposed to see me in this trash! I didn't evven knoww VVriska kneww wwhere I livved! All I knoww is one minute I'm standin' in front of a mirror an' the next I hear her laughing at me an' then. . . then I wwoke up in here wwith her tellin' me she wwas gonna make sure nobody forgot this . . . Oh cod, she told me you and Sol and. . .and. . .Fef were coming ovver to see me like this. . .And. . ." Eridan started hyperventilating almost, and I shook my head, a headache already forming. this was cruelty on a whole new level. I almost wanted to give Vriska some respect for plotting this, but I decided against it. I had a lot of fish to fry because of her now.

" It's going to be alright, okay Eridan? I'm the only one whose shown up so far, Fef and sol won't be here for another half hour. We'll figure something out between then and now." I crooned, trying to sound soothing. Eridan looked up at me, trying to stop panicking, his face still deep purple.

"I don't knoww howw wwe're going to do that. . . the only ways outta here are the wwindoww and the door, an' since the door's locked, all wwe'vve got is the fivve-story drop from the wwindoww. Vvris locked my Lusus up down stairs somewwhere, so wwe can't get him in any wway. . . No, this situation just keeps soundin' more an' more hopeless vvolp." He mumbled, shaking his head miserably. I shook my own head, grabbing his shoulder and heaving him up.

"Nah, It's cool. You forgot about my Lusus." I said simply, pulling him towards the window. I let out a shrill whistle, and a white shape appeared at the base of the hive. when I waved, it began to scale the castle wall, literally running up the side until it reached the window. I shoved Eridan onto Nez's back before climbing on myself, instructing him to head of Eq's hive.

"E-Equius?! wwhy in the glubbin' hell wwould wwe want to go there wwhen I look like this?!" Eridan complained, but I shook my head.

"We don't have time to get back to your hive and get some of your clothes, so I'm going to get Eq to lend me some of his, and I'll alter it to suit you. It's this, or your stuck wearing what you're in now." I stated simply. Eridan's face was a dark shade of purple still, but he didn't complain. We rocketed across the canyon, over the doomsday device and towards Eq's hive. when we arrived, I slid off of Nez's back and instructed him to hide with Eridan on his back until I whistled. he nodded and raced around to the back of the hive.  
I knocked on Eq's door, and was pleasantly surprised to see his face glaring back at me in only a few moments.  
"Natore'? what on alternia are you doing here uninvited?" He asked, sounding more surprised than annoyed.

"It's a really long story involving Vriska causing trouble again. Look, I've got a huge favor to ask of you. can I borrow a plain black T-shirt and a pair of shorts? pleeeeeeaaaaaase?" I begged. Equius glared at me, seeming skeptical.

"and might I implore what such articles of clothing will be used for?" He asked.

"No, no you may not. Just know I'll pay you back for them sometime later and be content with that knowlege." I replied matter of factly. after a couple more moments of awkward silence, Equius gave in, shaking his head.

"Wait here a moment. . ." He instructed reluctantly, disappearing from the doorway. he returned a moment later with a fresh black T-shirt and a pair of grey shorts. I grinned, thanked him and ran off to the back of his hive, hearing him mutter something as he shut his door.  
I Whistled for Nez and he appeared instantaniously before me. I muttered a couple of dates and a sewing kit and tape measure uncaptchalogged themselves, as well as some purple dye and a tub of water. Eridan stared at me blankly, as if seeing me for the first time as I went about this set up.

"Don't give me that funny look. you would be a traveling fashion studio too if you spent the past two weekends at Kanaya's hive." I stated, not even looking up. I took Eridan's measurements and re-stitched the shorts accordingly, tossing him the black T-shirt while I worked. I had fifteen minutes left on the clock to finish fixing this hell.

Nez helped as best he could, pouring purple dye into the water and picking up the shorts with his teeth when I finished fixing them, dropping them into the water. in a few moments, Eridan was wearing freshly-dyed purple shorts and a black T-shirt with his symbol across it. I removed the hair extensions and makeup with a little more work, but afterwards he looked like he usually did, but in some casual clothes.

"There. Not half bad for twenty five minutes. Now come on. we have a spider to one-up." I grinned, pulling Eridan back onto Nez. We managed to get back into the castle tower two minutes Before Fef and Sol walked in, with Vris going on and on about how they were going to loooooooove this surprise. When the door opened, me and Eridan looked up from our casual card game with a bit of boredom in our eyes, which was hard, since we both had to hold back the triumph we got when we saw the look of shock and rage on Vriska's face.

"Oh, hey. We were wondering when you were going to unlock the door. Hey Sollux." I said, waving casually. I stood up and looked at the third troll, Feferi. This was the first time we met.

"You must be Feferi. Vriska told me you'd be showing up with Sol. It's nice to meet you." I said, smiling. Feferi returned the smile, but she seemed a little confused.

"Nice to meet you too. You must be. . .Volpes, right? -Eridan was telling me about you when he got back from his last FLARP game. . . um, do you know why Vriska insisted we come here? because I don't know what her big surprise is in here, other than that Eridan's here. Oh, sorry Eridan! It's nice to sea you too!" She added, waving at him. I glanced at vriska, who looked absolutely furious.

"Hold that thought." I said, and then I deftly sidestepped both Feferi and Sollux, and slammed my fist into Vriska's face, efficiently knocking her the hell out. Then I turned my attention back to the three stunned faces watching me.

"Sorry, but that was payback. essentially, All three of us were invited to help embarrass the hell out of Eridan." I started. A look of alarm crossed Eridan's face, and he tried to cut me off, thinking I was going to tell the others the truth. But I didn't give him a chance.

"Vriska captured eridan's Lusus yesterday and threatened to feed it to her spider unless he came and got it, so he showed up here today. Then she slipped some weird drugs into a drink she gave him, which pretty much made him loopy. he said anything that came to his mind, which could be pretty embarrassing. Then, Vriska invited us over, so Eridan could say his most private and embarrassing thoughts in front of us." I summed up. Eridan's face went from confused to blank to a look of absolute respect in a series of seconds. Yeah, he was definetely going to owe me some serious pay back for this.

"I showed up early because I figured Vriska might have pulled something like this, and in response Vriska locked me in here with Eridan. luckily, I happened to have a couple of herbs in my first aid kit that treats most hallucination drugs, like the ones Vriska used. After I got Eridan to swallow some of the stuff, his head cleared up. we've been playing go fish while we waited for you guys to show up." I finished. Feferi shook her head, while sollux just shrugged.

"Oh cod. . .what a mess. I'm reely sorry about this. . ." Feferi apologized, but I shrugged, grinning.

"It's no problem. I finally got to meet the esteemed heiress, so I think helping out a friend and decking the spider pirate wasn't that much work." I said, shrugging. I turned to Eridan and Sollux.

"We 2hould probably go fiind Eriidan'2 2eahorse before Vrii2ka wake2 up and 2tart2 2pouting non2en2e." Sollux suggested, walking out of the room with his hands in his pockets. I nodded, following after him with Fef and Eridan right behind us. We each stepped over vriska and walked down the hall, heading down towards the dungeon areas of Vriska's hive. Sure enough, Eridan's lusus was chained up, losing his mind in a cage. Eridan calmed the creature down, and sollux used an 'optic blast' to bust the cage. Feferi used her trident to break the chains on the poor creature, and Eridan led it out of the hive, with the rest of us in tow. when we got out of there, we stood around awkwardly for a couple of minutes, not sure where to go from here. Eventually we decided that eridan and Fef should head back to the ocean, and me and sollux would head back to Sol's hive for a while. Eridan offered to give Fef a ride on his Lusus, which she accepted, commenting on how Eridan didn't look half bad in shorts. As they started to leave, Eridan glanced back at me with a look that said a thousand words, and all of them were 'thank you' I grinned, gave him a wink, and turned back to Sollux. Sollux was giving me a skeptical look.

We decided to float/fly back toward Sollux's hive, since Sollux's power could carry us both and my music could keep him focussed. we were about half there when Sollux finally started talking.

"That'2 not what really happened, ii2 iit?" He asked. I feigned confusion.

"What are you talking about?" I countered. Sollux glanced over at me, looking annoyed.

"You know what Ii'm talkiing about. What you told me and Fef. that was crap. iit'2 why you knocked out Vrii2ka fiir2t, 2o she couldn't cut iin wiith what really happened. But at the 2ame time, whatever 2he had planned, you foiled. Whiich ii2 why she looked 2o pii22ed off when 2he opened the door." As usual, Sollux was spot on.

"I think fef might have known What Vrii2ka wa2 goiing to 2how u2 too, when II met up with her 2he 2eemed really nervou2, and 2he already had mentioned thet Eriidan wa2n't an2wering her trolliing hiim. Whatever iit wa2, II don't thiink 2he wanted eriidan to know 2he knew, which i2 why 2he didn't que2tiion your liie eiither." He finished, letting the whole thing hang in the air for a while. I sighed. No real point in playing this charade anymore.

"Your right on both accounts. Which leads me to wonder some disturbing things, but I'll ignore those for now. please promise to just accept the lie and never question what actually might have occured today? I'll owe you like. . a thousand cookies, double chocolate chip." I bribed. this had become a common theme between us. Sollux would eat anything with doubles, including sweets. whenever I came over to his house, I'd usually have some sort of food with me with the word 'double' or 'two' worked into it's name. after a moment of deliberating sollux sighed and agreed.

"Alriight, but you owe me for holdiing my tounge. II would of loved to have called B2 on that fuckiing hiip2ter and 2ee the look on hii2 face." I sighed, smiling a bit. those two and their little hate fest. it would have been cute, if only I hadn't known how horribly it was going to end.


End file.
